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BY 



LUCIEN CARR 




BOSTON AND NEW YORK 

HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY 

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1888 

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Copyright, 1888, 
By LUCIEN CARR. 

.4^ n#fas reserved. 

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I%e Riverside Press, Cambridge: 
Electrotyped and Printed by H. 0. Houghton & Co. 



PKEFATORY NOTE. 



In the preparation of this volume the following works 
have been found of service, though it is proper to add 
that the list is by no means complete, and that it does 
not include any of the authoritative publications that 
have found their way into the newspapers and maga- 
zines of the day. 

Bancroft, H. H. History of the Pacific States. San Francisco. 
Barbe-Marbois. Histoire cle la Louisiane. Paris, 1829. 
Barnes, C. R. , editor. Commonwealth of Missouri. St. Louis, 

1877. 
Benton, Thomas H. Thirty Years in the Senate of the United 

States. New York, 1856. Abridgment of the Debates in 

Congress, from 1789 to 1856. New York. 
Bevier, R. S. History of the 1st and 2d Missouri Confederate 

Brigades. From Wakarusa to Appomattox. St. Louis, 1879. 
Billon, F. L. Annals of St. Louis. St. Louis, 1886. 
Brackenridge, H. M. Views of Louisiana. Pittsburgh, 1814. 

Recollections of the West, 2d edition. Philadelphia, 1868. 
Brown, G. W. Reminiscences of Old John Brown. Rockford, 

111., 1880. 
Buchanan's Administration. New York, 1866. 
Cooke, P. St. George. Conquest of California and New Mex- 
ico, New York, 1878. 
Davis and Durrie. History of Missouri. Cincinnati, 1876. 
Edwards, Richard, and M. Hopewell. The Great West. St. 

Louis, 1860. 
Flint, Timothy. Travels. Boston, 1826. 



VI PREFATORY NOTE. 

GayarrIs, Charles. History of Louisiana. New Orleans, 1885. 

Hughes, John T. Doniphan's Expedition. Cincinnati, 1848. 

Laws of the United States. 

Laws of the State of Missouri. 

Lunt, George. Origin of the Late War. New York, 1866. 

Margry, Pierre. Deeouverte de l'Amerique Septentrionale. 
Paris. 

Martin, F. X. History of Louisiana. New Orleans, 1827. 

Niles' Register. 

Official Records of the Rebellion. Washington. 

Parkman, Francis. Discovery of the Great West. Boston, 
1869. 

Peckham, James. General Nathaniel Lyon. New York, 1866. 

Proceedings of Congress. 

Proceedings of the Legislature of Missouri. 

Proceedings of Missouri State Conventions, 1861 and 1865. 

Sanborn, F. B. Life and Letters of John Brown. Boston, 
1885. 

Scharf, J. T. History of St. Louis. Philadelphia, 1883. 

Shea, John G. Discovery and Exploration of the Mississippi. 
New York, 1852. 

Snead, Thomas L. The Fight for Missouri. New York, 1886. 

Stoddard, Major Amos. Sketches of Louisiana. Philadel- 
phia, 1812. 

Von Holst. Constitutional History of the United States. Chi- 
cago. 

Wilkinson, General James. Memoirs of my own Times. 
Philadelphia, 1816. 

Winsor, Justin, Editor. Narrative and Critical History of 
America. Boston. 

The writer desires also to acknowledge his obligations 
to Messrs. Oscar W. Collet, of the Missouri Historical 
Society, John N. Dyer, of the Mercantile Library of 
St. Louis, General James Harding, Railroad Commis- 
sioner of the State, and to Alfred Carr, of the Insurance 
Department ; to Ex-Governors Thomas C. Fletcher and 
Charles H. Hardin, General D. M. Frost of the Con- 



PREFATORY NOTE. vii 

federate service, and to Messrs. James 0. Broadhead 
and Thomas T. Ganett, who as members of the Constitu- 
tional Convention, and in other capacities, did good ser- 
vice for the Union. To Mr. R. J. Holcombe of Chilli- 
cothe, Missouri, Andrew McF. Davis of Cambridge, 
Mass., and John Henry Brown of Dallas, Texas, the 
friend and aid-de-camp of General McCulloch, he is es- 
pecially indebted for friendly counsel and assistance. 

Cambridge, Mass., May 1, 1888. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

PAGE 

Discovery and Exploration df the Mississippi ... 1 



CHAPTER II. 
French Domination in the Mississippi Valley ... 21 

CHAPTER III. 
Spanish Domination 36 

CHAPTER IV. 
The Louisiana Purchase 63 

CHAPTER V. 
Louisiana Territory: 1804 to 1812 82 

CHAPTER VI. 
Missouri Territory: 1813 to 1821 117 

CHAPTER VII. 
The Missouri Compromise 139 

CHAPTER VIII. 
The Admission of Missouri into the Union .... 149 



X CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER IX. 
From 1820 to 1844 1G3 

CHAPTER X. 

The Annexation of Texas and the Conquest of New 
Mexico 189 

CHAPTER XI. 

The Jackson Resolutions: Internal Improvements: 
Education 220 

CHAPTER XII. 

Kansas Troubles: Progress of the State: Election 
of 1860 241 

CHAPTER XIII. 

The Legislature and the Constitutional Conven- 
tion: Missouri decides for the Union 26*7 

CHAPTER XIV. . 

The Arsenal, Camp Jackson, and the Second Meeting 
of the Convention 291 

CHAPTER XV. 

Springfield and Lexington: the Confederates 
evacuate the state . 324 

CHAPTER XVI. 

From the Evacuation of the State to the End of 
the War 342 

CHAPTER XVII. 

Abolition of Slavery : The Convention of 1865 and 
Test Oaths 363 



MISSOURI. 



CHAPTER I. 

DISCOVERY AND EXPLORATION OF THE MISSISSIPPI. 

Although the French were the first to explore the 
Mississippi, to map out its course, and to establish per- 
manent settlements upon its banks, they were not its 
discoverers ; neither were they the first to float upon its 
waters. That honor, if the term can be applied to what 
was but a lucky incident in a mad search after gold, be- 
longs to the Spaniards, and is usually ascribed to Her- 
nando de Soto, though upon what are believed to be 
insufficient grounds. Without stopping, however, to 
discuss the point, it is sufficient to say that almost a cen- 
tury and a half before the French explorers launched 
their frail canoes upon the stream, he stood upon its 
banks ; and whilst it is not possible to make out, with 
any degree of accuracy, the itinerary of his journey, 
there is but little hazard in asserting that the spot from 
which he first gazed upon its turbid waters must have 
been at or near the place where the city of Memphis 
now stands. 

Whether in the course of his wanderings he reached 
the confines of what is now known as the State of Mis- 
souri is a question that cannot be definitively settled. 



2 MISSOURI. 

The course and length of the journey which he is said 
to have made, after crossing the river, in order to reach 
the country of the Capahas, or, as they are now called, 
the Quapaws, would seem to indicate that he did ; the 
mounds and embankments, too, to say nothing of the 
other evidences of prehistoric life that are found in such 
profusion in the southeastern portion of the State, an- 
swer, with singular fidelity, to the descriptions which are 
given of the houses and villages of these people, as well 
as of their implements and ornaments ; and if to this be 
added the fact that, a hundred and fifty years later, 
they were living in the same region, though not, perhaps, 
in the identical localities, it will be seen that a strong 
presumptive case can be made out in favor of the truth 
of the theory. However, be this as it may, it is not a 
point upon which we care to insist, for even if the fact 
be admitted, it was not followed by any practical results. 
Like Cortes, Pizarro, and the rest of the Spanish con- 
querors, De Soto and his followers were primarily, not 
colonists, but 'adventurers in search of gold, and being 
disappointed in their object, they had no thought but to 
quit a country which had ceased to be attractive. Ac- 
cordingly in 1543, after two years more of wearisome 
marching and useless fighting, the survivors of the ex- 
pedition, reduced in numbers, and with their leader 
dead, found their way back to the banks of the river, 
and down it they sailed in hastily constructed brigan- 
tines, glad enough to escape from a region in which, 
instead of wealth and ease, they had met with nothing 
but privation and hardship, sickness and death. 

With the failure of this expedition, efforts to explore 
the Mississippi valley were, for the time being, brought 
to a close ; and it was not until after the lapse of a hun- 



DISCOVERY OF THE MISSISSIPPI. 6 

dred and thirty years that the work was again taken 
up and carried to a successful conclusion. In the mean 
time, the Atlantic coast, from Florida to Canada, had 
been dotted with colonies. Of these, some were com- 
paratively shortlived, as, for instance, the settlements of 
the Dutch and Swedes in New York and New Jersey 
respectively ; others, like the establishments of the Span- 
iards in Florida, appear to have been always in a mori- 
bund condition, and owed what little success they had to 
the rivalry of their neighbors, rather than to any strength 
of their own : so that by the close of the seventeenth 
century, the whole of the vast domain that lies east of 
the Mississippi and south of Hudson's Bay, except, per- 
haps, the peninsula of Florida, was in the hands of the 
English and French. 

These nations, enemies and rivals here, as they had 
been for generations on the other side of the water, 
were among the earliest to engage in the work of colo- 
nization. At first, their efforts met with but little suc- 
cess, and it was not until after repeated failures that they 
succeeded, in the first decade of the seventeenth century, 
in effecting permanent settlements at Jamestown and 
Quebec. Other points were gradually occupied, and 
as both nations claimed the whole of this region, and 
did not hesitate, when opportunity offered, to treat their 
rivals as interlopers, it soon brought on that long and 
bloody struggle which, beginning with Argall's destruc- 
tion of the French settlement on the island of Mount 
Desert in 1613, was only ended, a hundred and fifty 
years later, by the victory of Wolfe upon the Plains of 
Abraham. 

In watching the course of this struggle, or rather in 
noting the progress of these colonies, for the struggle 



4 MISSOURI. 

itself interests us but little, we cannot but be struck 
with the contrast that exists between the rapid advance 
of the French into the interior of the continent and the 
slow and steady growth of the English in the same 
direction. As early as 1639, only about thirty years 
after Quebec was founded, Nicolet was upon the Wis- 
consin and within three days' travel of the Mississippi, 
or as it was then thought, the ocean ; and in 1671, be- 
fore the Massachusetts colonists had closed in the death 
struggle with King Philip, and whilst the spot where 
now stands the city of Philadelphia was still a part of 
the virgin forest, the Jesuits had completed the circuit 
of Lake Superior, and were anxiously waiting for the 
word which, two years later, sent Joliet and Marquette 
on their voyage down the Mississippi. Various reasons 
are brought forward by way of accounting for the un- 
equal rate at which the colonies of these two nations 
moved westward, and, so far as the French are concerned, 
there can be no doubt that their progress in this direc- 
tion was due in great part to religious enthusiasm and 
the necessities of the fur-trade. Unquestionably there 
were other causes, as, for instance, the facility of inter- 
communication and the hostility of the Iroquois, which 
contributed either to hasten or retard the movement; 
but after all, in its last analysis, it was to the activity of 
the fur-trader and the zeal of the missionary that the 
French were indebted for their early acquaintance with 
all this region. 

To appreciate the full extent of the influence which 
these two classes exerted in bringing about this result, it 
is necessary to bear in mind that they had controlled the 
destinies of the colony from its very foundation ; and 
that, no matter how widely they may have differed at 



DISCOVERY OF THE MISSISSIPPI. 5 

times in their ends and aims, they were always alike in 
so far as they both depended, for their continued pros- 
perity, upon the extension of French influence among the 
native tribes. To them, every step in this direction 
meant an increase in the number of those who looked to 
Quebec for a market, or who trusted to it for religious 
instruction, and hence the energy with which they pushed 
their way into the interior, sought out new alliances, and 
established posts and missions wherever there was a 
promise of a commercial or a spiritual harvest. 

Urged on by considerations of this character, the Re- 
collet fathers visited the eastern shores of Lake Huron, 
and established themselves among the people of that 
name as early as 1615 ; and, by the middle of the cen- 
tury, the Jesuits, who had succeeded to the control of 
the religious affairs of the colony, had in operation 
among this same people one of the most flourishing 
missions that has ever existed among our North Ameri- 
can Indians. Unfortunately, however, for the success of 
the undertaking, the Iroquois war broke out afresh about 
this time, and those grim warriors, having obtained a 
supply of firearms from the English and Dutch traders, 
soon made a desert of all the region that lies between 
the Ottawa and the lakes. In their insane fury they 
spared neither missionary nor medicine man, neither 
Christian convert nor pagan devotee. 

Of those who escaped the general ruin, a part fled to 
the regions west of the Straits of Michilimackinac, and 
sought refuge along the southern shores of Lake Supe- 
rior. Hither, in due time, came the traders and the no 
less venturesome missionaries, and in this distant region 
they resumed the work which had met with such a 
bloody interruption. With characteristic energy they 



6 MISSOURI. 

established posts and founded missions among the Hu- 
ron refugees and their neighbors, and began at once 
that series of explorations which, in the course of the 
next fifteen years, not only made the French familiar 
with the geography of the upper lakes, but brought 
them to the head waters of streams which, flowing to- 
wards the southwest, emptied into a river that led they 
knew not whither, " perhaps into the Sea of Virginia, 
the Gulf of Mexico, or possibly into the Vermillion Sea " 
and the Pacific Ocean. 

Henceforward the discovery of this river and of the 
great valley through which it flows was a foregone con- 
clusion. In fact, its existence seems already to have 
been generally known both to the traders and the mis- 
sionaries, for there is scarcely a record of the period in 
which the references to it are not more or less frequent. 
In 1658 two traders, Radisson and Groseilliers, win- 
tered on the shores of Lake Superior, and brought back 
stories of the Sioux and of the great river upon which 
they dwelt. A few years later Father Allouez confirmed 
their account, and in 1669-70, in the course of his mis- 
sionary labors, he visited the Mascoutens, who were then 
living on the Wisconsin, " within six days' sail of the 
Mississippi." La Salle, too, was not idle ; for it was 
about this time that, taking advantage of a lull in- the 
Iroquois war, he started out in search of the mysterious 
stream ; and, though the evidence is not sufficient to 
prove that he reached it during the course of this ex- 
pedition, yet there seems to be no doubt that he dis- 
covered the Ohio, and perhaps also the Illinois. Last, 
but not least, Marquette, in the " Relation of 1670," re- 
ports what the Illinois had told him of this river ; and, 
in his far distant station, near the western extremity of 



DISCOVERY OF THE MISSISSIPPI. 7 

Lake Superior, he was planning a visit to the " nations 
that inhabit it, in order to open the passage to so many 
of our fathers, who have long awaited this happiness." 
Indeed, a mission among the Illinois is said to have 
been decided on, and he was already studying that lan- 
guage when the station at St. Esprit was broken up by 
the Sioux, and the unfortunate Hurons were obliged to 
resume their wanderings. Following his flock as they 
retraced their steps towards the east, he came with 
them to the Straits of Michilimackinac, where, tempted 
by the abundance of fish and the facilities of trade, they 
halted and fortified themselves. Here he built a log 
chapel and founded the mission of St. Ignatius, and 
here he passed the next two years of his life in the 
faithful discharge of the round of duties that fell to his 
lot, though his thoughts seem to have been ever turned 
towards the Mississippi. Even when writing hopefully 
of his work among the Hurons, as he did in 1672, he 
avows his willingness " to give it up and go to seek new 
nations towards the south sea ... to teach them of 
our Great God," whenever it should be thought advis- 
able for him to do so. 

Fortunately he had not long to wait, for, in the au- 
tumn of this year, Frontenac became governor ; and as 
he was a man of ideas as well as of action, he quickly 
saw the importance of the scheme which he had inher- 
ited from Talon for the occupation of the interior of 
the continent, and he determined to carry out the plan 
which had already been partially formed for the dis- 
covery and exploration of the Mississippi. Joliet, who 
had been educated for a Jesuit, but who was now a fur- 
trader, and a man of experience, and " had already 
been near the great river," was chosen for the work, 



8 MISSOURI. 

and with him was associated Marquette, the saintly- 
missionary at Point St. Ignatius, or, as it is now called, 
Mackinaw. 

Starting on his journey without any unnecessary de- 
lay, Joliet reached the mission at Mackinaw, and on 
the 8th of December, the festival of the Immaculate 
Conception, gave Marquette the news that he had been 
assigned to the expedition, — a coincidence which the 
good father does not fail to notice. During the next 
few months, the explorers busied themselves in collect- 
ing what information they could as to their route, for 
they were determined that the enterprise " should not 
be foolhardy," even if it were hazardous. From the 
accounts given by the Indians " who had frequented 
these parts," they were able to trace a map of all the 
new country, marking down the rivers on which they 
were to sail, the names of the nations and places 
through which they were to pass, the course of the great 
river, and what direction they were to take when they 
reached it. Everything seems to have been done coolly 
and systematically, and, so far as it was possible to see 
into the future, nothing was left to chance. With the 
return of spring, the final preparations were made for 
the journey, "the duration of which," we are told, 
" they could not foresee." This did not take them 
long, for their outfit was simple, consisting merely of 
two birch canoes and a supply of Indian corn and dried 
meat. They also engaged five men to accompany them ; 
and then, having put their voyage under the protection 
of the Blessed Virgin, they set out on the 17th of May, 
1673, " firmly resolved to do all and suffer all for so 
glorious an enterprise." 

Skirting along the shores of Lake Michigan and 



DISCOVERY OF THE MISSISSIPPI 9 

Green Bay, they entered Fox River, and followed it up 
to the water-shed which divides the lakes from the 
Mississippi. This they crossed, and, launching their 
canoes upon the Wisconsin, they paddled down stream 
" for a distance of seventy leagues," when, on the 17th 
of June, they found themselves upon the broad bosom of 
the Mississippi. 

Descending with the current, they cautiously felt their 
way along, anchoring at night at some distance from 
the shores. In a few simple sentences the good father 
describes the country through which they passed, and 
the different kinds of animals which they met. Espe- 
cially was he struck with the size of the fish, and the 
appearance of the buffaloes. At length, on the 25th, 
they discovered on the west bank of the river footprints 
and a beaten path which led into a beautiful prairie. 
Rightly conjecturing that it was the pathway to an In- 
dian village, they followed it for some two leagues, 
when they came to a cluster of three villages, which, to 
their great relief, were inhabited by bands of the Illinois, 
the very tribe which Marquette had long been anxious 
to visit. Here they were received with true Indian hos- 
pitality. A feast of four courses was duly prepared, 
during which the several dishes were fed to them as if 
they were children. They were also treated to the 
u calumet " dance, and, what was more to the point, one 
of these mysterious pipes was given to them as a safe- 
guard, for with it " you can march fearlessly among 
enemies, who, even in the heat of battle, lay down their 
arms when it is shown." 

Resuming their journey, they coasted along the Piasa 
bluffs, on which were painted two frightful monsters as 
large as calves, " with horns on the head like a deer, a 



10 MISSOURI. 

fearful look, red eyes, bearded like a tiger, the face some- 
what like a man's, the body covered with scales, and the 
tail so long that it twice makes the turn of the body, pass- 
ing over the head and down between the legs, and ending 
at last in a fish's tail." These figures were so " high up on 
the rock that it must have been difficult to get at them 
in order to paint them," and yet the work is said to have 
been so well done that " good painters in France would 
find it hard to do as well." Green, red, and black were 
the colors used, and altogether it seems to have been 
a very creditable piece of savage workmanship. Hav- 
ing passed this fearful spot, " on which the boldest In- 
dian dare not gaze long, and whilst still talking about 
it/' they came to the mouth of the Missouri. From 
the description of the scene, it must have been during 
the spring freshet, and any one who has ever looked 
upon the junction of these two mighty streams at such 
a time will not fail to appreciate the dangers to which 
our explorers were now exposed. Luckily, however, 
they escaped, and holding on their course for a few days 
longer they reached the mouth of the Ohio, or Oua- 
boukigou, on which the Shawnees are said to have had 
thirty-eight villages. 

Soon after leaving this point, and whilst floating la- 
zily along, scorched by the sun and a prey to the mos- 
quitoes, they were startled by seeing on the east bank 
of the river a band of Indians, who were armed with 
guns, wore cloth clothes, and had hoes, hatchets, beads, 
and other things which had evidently been obtained from 
the whites. Marquette now displayed the calumet, 
which was at once recognized, and he and his party were 
invited to land and to partake of a feast, at which they 
were served with "wild beef, bear's oil, and white 



DISCOVERY OF THE MISSISSIPPI. 11 

plums." The next morning they again set out, and after 
a monotonous journey of some days they came to a 
village of the Mitchigamea, which was situated eight or 
ten leagues above the mouth of the Arkansas. Here, for 
the first time, they met with what promised to be a hos- 
tile reception. The war-whoop was sounded, the young 
warriors crowded to the attack, and one of them threw 
his war club, which fortunately missed its aim. It 
was a critical moment, but just at this time some of 
the old men appeared upon the scene, and, recognizing 
the peace-pipe which Marquette held aloft, they checked 
the ardor of the young warriors and put an end to the 
threatened conflict. The Frenchmen were now invited to 
land, and after a friendly conference and the usual feast, 
they passed the night in the cabins of their entertainers, 
but " not without some uneasiness." Embarking again 
the next day, they reached the village of the Arkansas 
(" Akamsea"), which was situated opposite the mouth of 
the river of that name, in what is now the State of 
Mississippi. As their coming had been announced, they 
were received with every mark of honor. A feast was 
given them which seems to have lasted all day, and at 
night the chief danced the calumet as a mark of perfect 
assurance, and then, to remove all fears, he presented 
one of these pipes to Marquette. 

From these Indians they learned that they were ten 
days' journey from the sea, and that the lower portion 
of the river was so infested by hostile tribes, armed 
with guns, that any farther progress in that direction 
would be attended with great danger. Under these cir- 
cumstances, the explorers held a council and decided to 
return. They had gone far enough to satisfy themselves 
that the Mississippi emptied into the Gulf of Mexico, 



12 MISSOURI. 

and they were fearful if they went farther of being cap- 
tured by the Indians or Spaniards, and thus losing the 
fruits of their labors. Accordingly on the 17th of July 
they set out on their homeward voyage. When they 
reached the mouth of the Illinois they determined to re- 
turn by that route instead of by the way by which they 
came. This, we are told, shortened their journey, and 
brought them without trouble to the lake of the Illinois, 
or, as it is now called, Michigan. Coasting along its 
western shores, they reached the mission at the head of 
Green Bay on the last of September, having been gone 
just four months and traveled over twenty-five hun- 
dred miles. 

Leaving Marquette here, to rest and recuperate, Joliet 
pushed on to Quebec. When near Montreal, and al- 
most in sight of his destination, his canoe was upset, and 
all his papers were lost. It was a serious accident, but 
fortunately not irreparable, for Marquette, too, had kept 
a journal of the voyage ; and though Joliet made a short 
report from memory, yet it is to the narrative of the 
worthy Jesuit that we are chiefly indebted for what we 
know of this expedition. In the map which accom- 
panies his " Relation," he has rudely sketched the river 
system of the valley as far as it was known ; and in his 
speculations as to the length and course of the Missouri, 
and his familiarity with the names and locations of some 
of the tribes that dwelt upon its banks, as well as of 
those that lived upon the Ohio, he gives a very favor- 
able idea of the extent and character of the knowledge 
which, even at this early day, the French had acquired 
of the geography of all this region. 

Important as were the results of this expedition, there 
was yet much to be done before the full benefits of the 



DISCOVERY OF THE MISSISSIPPI. 13 

discovery could be reaped. The upper and lower por- 
tions of the river were yet to be explored, and when 
this was done and the course of the great river was 
known through its entire length, measures would still 
have to be taken for the occupation of the country through 
which it flowed. This was a vast undertaking, but it 
was of a character that was suited to the spirit of that 
age, and La Salle, who " had obtained the grant of Fort 
Frontenac, the monopoly of the lake trade, and a patent 
of nobility," now set out to accomplish it. He was a 
friend if not a partner of the governor, and he had 
rich relatives in France who were willing to assist him, 
so that he was able to command political influence and 
money, or its equivalent, credit. Besides these essential 
requisites he was endowed with certain attributes of 
mind and body, and was possessed of a measure of ex- 
perience that fitted him for the work. He had already, 
as has been said, discovered the Ohio, and probably the 
Illinois too ; and if he did not reach the Mississippi, he 
certainly knew of its existence, and he may possibly 
have identified it with the great river of De Soto. At 
all events, he seems to have had very clear ideas as to 
where it emptied and of its commercial possibilities, for 
he had obtained a monopoly of the fur-trade of the val- 
ley, and contemplated the erection of forts and the es- 
tablishment of colonies at such points as would give him 
the control of this trade in fact as well as in name, and 
thus enable him to establish his fortunes upon a sure 
foundation. 

In pursuance of this plan, he led an expedition to 
the Illinois, in the winter of 1679-80, and built a fort 
on that stream, just below Peoria lake, to which he gave 
the name of Creoe-cmur. From this point as a base, 



14 MISSOURI. 

he dispatched Father Hennepin to explore the lower 
Illinois and the upper Mississippi, whilst he himself re- 
turned to Fort Frontenac, now Kingston, in order to 
look after his affairs, which had fallen into confusion. 

After some delay, growing out of his unwillingness to 
undertake the expedition, Hennepin finally set out on 
the 29th of February, 1680. On the 11th of April, when 
near the mouth of the Wisconsin, he was captured by a 
party of Sioux, who adopted him into the tribe. In their 
company he visited the Falls of St. Anthony, which he 
named ; and with them he remained until the autumn 
of that year, when he was rescued by Du Lhut. During 
the next year, and without having seen La Salle, or made 
any report to him, the tricky friar sailed for Eurojje. 
Soon afterwards he published a narrative of his journey, 
in which he gave a description of the river above the 
mouth of the Wisconsin, and an account of the manners 
and customs of the Sioux. This is the only publication 
he ever made that is entitled to any credence, and even 
in this, some of the statements are to be taken with many 
grains of allowance. In the edition issued some years 
later, he involves himself in such a net-work of false- 
hoods and contradictions as to cast discredit upon the 
work which he really performed. 

In the mean time La Salle, having restored his affairs 
to something like order, returned to the Illinois, only to 
find that, during the absence of Tonti, his fort had been 
plundered and destroyed by his own men. This neces- 
sitated another trip to Fort Frontenac, which must have 
been made in 1681, for in December of that year he 
was, once again, at the head of Lake Michigan, accom- 
panied by Tonti, Father Membre, and some others, who 
had been faithful to him during his adverse fortunes, 



DISCOVERY OF THE MISSISSIPPI. 15 

and who were now to share with him in the glory of his 
discovery. Including these faithful friends and follow- 
ers, the party which he had made up for the descent of 
the Mississippi consisted of twenty-three Frenchmen 
and thirty-one Indians, of whom ten were women and 
three children. 

Loading their canoes upon sledges, they dragged them 
across the portage and down the frozen Illinois to the 
foot of Peoria lake, where they found open water. Here 
they embarked, and after a somewhat uneventful voyage 
they reached the Mississippi on the 6th of February, 
1682, and the Gulf on the 9th of the following April. 
Having found a suitable spot La Salle erected a cross, 
raised the arms of France, and, in a proces verbal, which 
was duly witnessed, he took possession of all the region 
watered by the Mississippi and its tributaries, and he 
named it Louisiana, in honor of his sovereign, Louis 
XIV., by the grace of God King of France and Na- 
varre. 

The work of exploration was now complete, but the 
more difficult task of occupation still remained, and to 
this La Salle now devoted all his energies. Returning 
to the Illinois he dispatched Father Membre to Europe, 
with the news of his discovery, whilst he himself built a 
fort on Starved Rock, — a bluff near where the town of 
Ottawa now stands, — which he intended to serve as a 
centre of trade and a place of refuge against the inroads 
of the Iroquois. Around this point he speedily gathered 
a large colony, consisting of a score of Frenchmen, to 
whom he made grants of lands, and of some thousands 
of Indians, belonging to different tribes, who were drawn 
thither by the prospects of trade, and by the promise of 
protection which the fort afforded. 



16 MISSOURI. 

Leaving Tonti in command of this motley crowd, 
La Salle, in the autumn of 1683, sailed for France, 
where his presence was sadly needed. His friend and 
partner, Frontenac, was no longer governor, and La Barre, 
who was now at the head of affairs, had identified him- 
self with his enemies, and did not hesitate at any meas- 
ures that were necessary to effect his ruin. Fort Fron- 
tenac was seized on the ground that he had not com- 
plied with the conditions upon which it had been granted 
to him ; his men were prevented from obtaining sup- 
plies ; the Iroquois were told that they might rob and 
kill him with impunity ; and an officer was sent out to 
take possession of the fort which he had built on the 
Illinois. Such was the condition of affairs when he left 
for Europe, and it must be confessed that the outlook 
was anything but encouraging. He was in debt, and as 
all his property had been seized, and much of it wasted, 
there seemed to be no way by which he could extricate 
himself. La Salle, however, was not a person to be 
daunted by difficulties. Proceeding to Paris, he laid his 
case before the colonial minister, and, fortunately for 
himself, he found in that officer a warm advocate. 
Frontenac, too, was again in favor, and by the aid of 
these two powerful friends he soon succeeded in re- 
establishing his affairs upon a firm basis. Not only 
were his forts restored, but La Barre was ordered to 
make reparation for the injury which had been done 
him, and means were furnished him for establishing a 
post and colony near the mouth of the Mississippi. 

In a memorial which he prepared at this time for the 
use of the king, he gave a brief statement of what he 
had already accomplished ; set forth his views and 
plans at some length ; and drew such a flattering pic- 



DISCOVERY OF THE MISSISSIPPI. 17 

ture of the military possibilities of the proposed colony 
in the event of a war with Spain, that the king granted 
him all the supplies that were asked for. Soldiers, of 
whom Father Le Clerc did not have a very high opinion, 
were recruited for the expedition, as were "three or 
four mechanics in each trade," who were subsequently 
found to know nothing at all about their several occupa- 
tions. Some eight or ten families of good people vol- 
unteered to go, as did a number of girls, who were 
" allured by the prospect of certain marriage." A full 
complement of priests, too, was added, among whom 
were La Salle's brother — the Sulpitian, Cavelier — 
and the Recollet Friars Membre, Douay, and Le Clerc. 
At length, all things being ready, the expedition sailed 
from Rochelle on the 24th of July, 1684, and, after a 
series of misfortunes which seem to have attended them 
from the beginning of the voyage, they reached the 
Gulf of Mexico, and sighted land on the 28th of De- 
cember. By accident, or owing to ignorance, or pos- 
sibly, as Joutel suggests, to treachery, they passed the 
mouths of the Mississippi, and coasted along in an aim- 
less sort of way until about the middle of February, 
1685 ; the colonists were finally landed on the shores of 
Matagorda Bay, which La Salle had wrongly supposed 
to be one of the outlets of the great river. Here he 
built a fort ; and, having satisfied himself that he was 
too far westward, he started out to find the Mississippi, 
for lie knew well that until it was found, and the colony 
was safely transferred to its banks, all his expenditure 
of time, labor, and money had been in vain. The effort, 
however, was not attended with success, and equally 
futile was a second attempt made in the following 
year (1686). 



18 MISSOURI. 

Meanwhile, the affairs of the colony had been going 
from bad to worse. In addition to other misfortunes, 
disease and death had been busy among them. " Out of 
one hundred and eighty colonists less than forty-five 
remained," and they were weighed down by gloomy 
forebodings as to the future. It was no longer a ques- 
tion of the success of the expedition, but a matter of life 
and death to the few colonists who were left. In this 
extremity, La Salle determined to go to his fort on the 
Illinois, the nearest point from which he could expect 
assistance. It was a hazardous undertaking; but it 
was the best thing that could be done. After a pain- 
ful parting, " which all felt was to be their last," he set 
out on the 17th of January, 1687, and, on the 19th of 
March, he, together with one of his nephews, his ser- 
vant, and his faithful Shawnee hunter, Nika, was mur- 
dered by some of his own men. Upon his death, the 
murderers took control of the party, and for a while 
they carried matters with a high hand. In a short time 
they quarreled over a division of the property, and, by 
a sort of retributive justice, the two principal criminals 
were in their turn killed by their accomplices. The 
party now divided. Joutel, the two Caveliers, and Fa- 
ther Douay, who had all been true to their leader, 
pushed on, and, at the end of two months, they reached 
the post which Tonti had established the year previous 
at the mouth of the Arkansas. From here they pro- 
ceeded by relatively easy marches to the fort on the Illi- 
nois, where they were well cared for by the faithful Tonti, 
to whom they falsely represented that La Salle was alive 
and in good health, and from whom they borrowed the 
money necessary to continue their journey. A few 
months later he learned the truth about La Salle, where- 



DISCOVERY OF THE MISSISSIPPI. 19 

upon he again descended the river in the hope of being 
able to render some assistance to the colonists who had 
been left at the fort on Matagorda Bay. In this gen- 
erous effort he was doomed to disappointment. When on 
Red River he was deserted by six out of the eight men 
who were with him ; and though he kept on for some 
time longer, he was obliged in the end to give up the 
undertaking, owing to the accidental loss of all his am- 
munition, and to the refusal of the Indians, among 
whom he then was, to furnish him with guides. Under 
these circumstances he decided to retrace his steps ; and, 
after a journey in which he suffered great hardships, 
he reached the Arkansas in July, 1689, and the fort on 
the Illinois in September of the same year. 

Disastrous as was this attempt at colonizing the lower 
Mississippi, it did not long delay that event. The situ- 
ation was too important, considered either strategically 
or commercially, to be overlooked ; and, as La Salle 
had foretold, both the English and Spaniards stood 
ready to seize it, or to occupy such positions along the 
coast as would enable them to neutralize any advantage 
which the French might hope to gain from its posses- 
sion. Indeed, with this end in view, the Spaniards are 
said to have fortified Pensacola as early as 1696, and 
some three years later an English expedition ascended 
the Mississippi, but was turned back by a stratagem of 
the French, who had anticipated their arrival by only a 
few months. These designs on the part of their rivals 
were well known to the French, and caused them to 
hasten the preparations they were making for the occu- 
pation of the mouth of the river. Accordingly, in 1698, 
the Canadian, Iberville, was sent out in command of an 
expedition, and, after a successful voyage, he landed at 



20 MISSOURI. 

old Biloxi in February of the following year and built 
a fort. From this point the neighboring coast and the 
lower portion of the river were explored ; and it was 
during one of these expeditions that Bienville was 
handed the letter which, fourteen years before, Tonti 
had left for La Salle. Other points were occupied in 
due time, and soon traders and missionaries began to 
ascend and descend the river. The journey, however, 
was not always free from danger, as there were times 
when, owing to the intrigues of English traders and 
other causes, tribes, like the Chickasaws and Natchez, 
dug up the hatchet and " barred " the river. As a 
rule, though, these occasions were rare ; and the jour- 
ney was made without other dangers and discomforts 
than those of the river and climate. By superior man- 
agement the French were able to counteract the influ- 
ence of the English with the river tribes, and for fifty 
years and more — from the settlement in 1699 until the 
cession to Spain in 1762 — the Mississippi was to all 
intents and purposes a French river. 



CHAPTER II. 

FRENCH DOMINATION IN THE MISSISSIPPI VALLEY. 

During the whole of the period that the French held 
the control of the valley, Missouri, as such, had no sep- 
arate legal existence and not a single settlement that 
has proved to be permanent, except, perhaps, Ste. Gene- 
vieve. Exactly when the " old " village of this name 
was founded is a matter that cannot be positively deter- 
mined ; and it is not important that it should be, except 
in so far as it may serve to throw light upon the time 
when the French besran to familiarize themselves with 
the resources of the region west of the Mississippi. 
Upon this point the testimony of Penicaut is of interest. 
He arrived in lower Louisiana in 1699, and in 1700 he 
made one of the party that ascended the river with Le 
Sueur for the purpose of opening a copper mine which 
was supposed to be on one of the tributaries of the 
Minnesota. In the journal which he kept of that expe- 
dition, he refers to the salt licks near Ste. Genevieve, and 
says that they were resorted to by the French and In- 
dians, and that " presently " there was a settlement of 
the French at that place. He also speaks of a mine sit- 
uated fifty leagues west of the Mississippi, from which 
the Indians got their supply of lead, and to which they 
went by way of the Maramec. These statements are 
explicit ; they are borne out by the facts as they now 
exist, and if they do not fix the precise date when Ste. 



22 MISSOURI. 

Genevieve was first settled, they at least justify the in- 
ference that it was shortly after the arrival of the French 
at the village of Kaskaskia, on the other side of the 
river, and hence, that it must have been early in the 
eighteenth century, and not about the middle, as some- 
times supposed. They also indicate, with reasonable cer- 
tainty, the date when the French began to make use of 
the mineral and other natural resources in which the 
region lying between the Mississippi and the Maramec 
abounded. 

From this time forward, the career of the French in 
" the Illinois," as this portion of the colony was called, 
can be easily traced. At first, and for a quarter of a 
century or more, it would seem as if they must have been 
given over almost altogether to the search after silver 
and copper. At all events, this is the not unnatural in- 
ference from the prominence accorded to this pursuit, 
in all the official documents. As a matter of fact, how- 
ever, there are two sides to the shield, though there can 
be no question that, so far as it was possible for the home 
authorities to make it so, the search for silver was, for a 
number of years, the controlling interest in the little col- 
ony. As early as 1703, a party of twenty set out to go 
from Kaskaskia to New Mexico, by way of the Missouri 
River, for the purpose of ... " visiting certain mines 
which were said, by the Indians, to yield a kind of lead 
that was white and of no account because it did not 
melt in the fire," as did the true lead found nearer 
home. Of the fate of this expedition nothing is known, 
but the feasibility of the journey is placed beyond 
doubt by the fact that, in 1714, specimens of silver 
were forwarded to La Mothe Cadillac, at Mobile, and 
the report that they had been taken from mines near 



FRENCH DOMINATION. 23 

Kaskaskia brought that official up the river only to find 
that he had been deceived, and that the specimens 
had really come from Mexico. In spite of disappoint- 
ments like these, and of the fact that thus far not a 
particle of silver had been found in this region, the co- 
lonial authorities were satisfied that it would ultimately 
be discovered, and they ascribed the failure to find it 
to the want of skill on the part of their agents. 

Impressed with this belief, the directors of the Mis- 
sissippi Company, who had come into the possession of 
the charter of the colony after its relinquishment by 
Crozat, in 1717, sent out several parties composed of 
men who were supposed to be accustomed to this kind 
of work, though Charlevoix, for reasons that appear to 
be good and sufficient, doubts their capacity. Among 
the first to arrive was the Sieur de Lochon, who came 
out in 1719. He " dug in a place that was showed him, 
took up a pretty large quantity of the mineral, a pound 
of which, that took up four days to melt, produced, as 
they say, two drachms of silver ; but some persons sus- 
pect that he put in the silver." A few months later 
he tried for lead, "and from two or three thousand 
weight of the mineral he extracted fourteen pounds of 
very bad lead, which cost him 1,400 livres." Dishear- 
tened by this failure, he gave up the work and returned 
to France. Other parties followed in quick succession, 
but met with no better success. They found no silver, 
or, if they did, they put it into the melting pots them- 
selves ; and though lead was abundant, yet they got but 
little, for the reason that " they did not know how to 
construct their furnaces." Finally, in 1720, there came 
the Sieur Renaud, one of the directors of the company, 
who is said to have surveyed these Maramec mines very 



24 MISSOURI. 

thoroughly. He fared no better in the search for sil- 
ver than did his predecessors, and his errand here would 
not call for further comment but for the fact that, in 
1723, the earliest grants of lands in what is now known 
as the State of Missouri were made to him, and because, 
either directly or indirectly, he was the means of intro- 
ducing negro slavery into this portion of the colony. 
According to the chronicles of the day, there came with 
him "many families who had received concessions of 
lands in the neighborhood of Kaskaskia, and who brought 
with them a number of negroes, granted to them by 
Bienville, for the purpose of cultivating these lands." 
After this we hear but little of silver, though as late 
as 1744 Vaudreuil forwarded to France certain speci- 
mens of copper, which were said to have been found in 
the district of the Illinois. The lead mines of this re- 
gion, however, were steadily worked, and among the 
articles sent down the river, lead was not the least im- 
portant. 

But whilst the authorities at New Orleans and Paris 
were dreaming of silver mines and squandering large 
sums of money in a vain search for them, the colonists 
in this district, consisting almost entirely of emigrants 
from Canada, were quietly pursuing the even tenor of 
their way, and devoting more or less of their atten- 
tion to the trade in furs, and to the more prosaic but 
not less useful business of farming. Besides the ex- 
pedition up the Missouri, to which reference has already 
been made, they explored the Des Moines and the 
Osage, and penetrated into Kansas among the Panis, 
where Dutigne", in 1719, planted the arms of France. 
This steady progress westward excited the jealousy of 
the Spaniards, and, in 1720, they fitted out an expedition 



FRENCH DOMINATION. 25 

for the purpose of taking a position on the Missouri 
which would enable them to check the advance of the 
French in this direction, and divert the trade of the 
Indians from Kaskaskia to Santa Fe. In this they were 
unsuccessful, as the expedition fell among hostile tribes 
and was destroyed. 

Alarmed by the boldness of this expedition, and with 
the view of guarding against future danger from this 
quarter, as well as in the expectation of extending 
their trade, the French sent a force up the Missouri, 
and built a fort near a village of the tribe of that 
name, which they called Fort Orleans. 1 At the date of 
their arrival here, a general war was raging between the 
Padoucas on one side, and the Missouris, Osages, Iowas, 
Pawnees, Ottos, Mahas, etc., on the other. As these 
last were all friends of the French, and the war inter- 
fered very seriously with the trade in " buffalo's wool," it 
became a matter of the first importance to bring about a 
peace between these tribes. Accordingly, M. de Bourg- 
mont, the commandant of Fort Orleans, summoned 
them to meet him at a council which was held in 1724, 
at a point situated on one of the western tributaries of 
the Kansas, when and where the pipe was smoked, and 
a general peace was concluded. Soon after this, Fort 
Orleans was destroyed and the garrison massacred, 
probably by the Missouris, though upon this point there 
is room for doubt. Bossu, however, ascribes it to them, 
and intimates that the outbreak was due to the frauds 
practiced upon them in the way of trade, and to the 
fact that the French debauched their women. 

1 Du Pratz says this fort was on an island opposite the village of 
the Missouris. There is reason, however, to believe that it may 
have been on the south side of the river, fifteen or twenty miles 
above the mouth of Grand River. Margry, vi. p. 393. 



26 MISSOURI. 

These were the only occasions, during the rule of the 
French, upon which the settlers in this portion of the 
colony were exposed to serious danger, though they 
bore their share of the loss entailed by Bienville's un- 
successful war with the Chickasaws, and took a promi- 
nent part in the fighting which began about the middle 
of the century, on the head waters of the Ohio, and ended 
in the treaty of Paris, February, 1763, and the expul- 
sion of the French from the North American continent. 

During all these years the little settlement on the Illi- 
nois, left in a great measure to itself, and separated by 
a thousand miles and more from the intrigues and ex- 
actions that prevailed at Quebec and New Orleans, con- 
tinued to grow slowly but steadily in population and 
prosperity. Besides the fur-trade which now extended 
some three or four hundred leagues up the Missouri, 
and the lead mines of the Maramec from which the 
yield was, practically, unlimited, the agricultural pro- 
ducts of the district began to assume important propor- 
tions. From the first arrival of the French in this 
quarter, they had given more or less of their attention 
to the cultivation of the soil, and it was owing to this 
fact that they were exempt from the oft recurring sea- 
sons of scarcity to which the inhabitants of New Orleans 
and the settlers on the Gulf coast were subject. As 
early as 1721, Charlevoix, writing from Kaskaskia, says 
that the French in that neighborhood were living " pretty 
much at their ease." They cultivated wheat and corn, 
and had domestic cattle and fowls. The Indians, too, 
whose villages adjoined the settlements of the French, 
were " very laborious, and cultivated their fields in 
their own fashion." A few years later, the farm prod- 
ucts of this " district " had increased to such an extent 



FRENCH DOMINATION. 27 

that they constituted a regular article of shipment. Le 
Page du Pratz and Bossu both speak of the amount of 
flour which was sent to New Orleans, and Yaudreuil 
who, in 1743, succeeded Bienville as governor, and who 
was not a partial witness, in a letter to the minister, says 
that every year, in the latter part of December, there 
came from " the Illinois " boats loaded with " flour, corn, 
bacon hams, both of bear and hog, corned pork and 
wild beef, myrtle and beeswax, cotton, tallow, leather, 
tobacco, lead, copper, buffalo-wool, venison, poultry, 
bear's grease, oil, skins, fowls, and hides." Varied as 
is this list, it is not complete, for Captain Pittman, who 
traveled up the river soon after the eastern portion of 
the valley fell into the hands of the English, adds " beer 
and wines." This is certainly a very creditable show- 
ing, and furnishes good grounds for doubting Vaudreuil's 
sincerity, when he seeks to justify his grant to Deruis- 
seau of the monopoly of the fur-trade of the Missouri, 
by saying that the only way in which he could make the 
people in this part of the colony abandon their wander- 
ing mode of life and settle down to farm work, was by 
preventing them from trading with the Indians, and by 
prohibiting them from acquiring any more negro slaves. 
The two statements, to say the least, do not harmonize. 
A wandering life is never compatible with the success- 
ful employment of slave labor, and the fact that, in 1745, 
the negroes in this district were half as many as the 
whites, is not only conclusive as to the profitable use of 
this form of labor, but it is equally decisive as to the 
manner of life of the owners of these slaves, even with- 
out the confirmatory evidence of the products which 
they annually sent down the river. 

Notwithstanding the measure of success which at- 



28 MISSOURI. 

tended this corner of the colony, Louisiana, taken as 
a whole, and regarded, as colonies then were, simply 
as a mercantile venture, was a decided failure. So 
far from returning a profit upon the sums expended, 
there never was a time when it was self-supporting. 
Under the system of restrictions upon trade and produc- 
tion which prevailed, and which embodied the highest 
commercial wisdom of the day, the colonists were vir- 
tually prohibited from producing anything that could 
be obtained from the mother country. They were 
taught to look to France even for their food. As a con- 
sequence, on more than one occasion when the supplies 
failed to arrive, the settlers on the lower Mississippi 
and along the Gulf coast were reduced to such straits 
that they were obliged to quarter themselves upon 
the neighboring Indians, in order to escape starvation. 
As late as 1741, owing to the destruction by a storm 
of the warehouse in which their provisions were stored, 
the inhabitants of Mobile and of some other places in 
that part of the colony were threatened with a famine ; 
and the dispatches of that day and even those of a much 
later date are filled with pitiful appeals to France for 
aid. Of course, so long as those who held the franchise 
of the colony, no matter whether it was the state, a com- 
pany, or an individual, were able and willing to furnish 
the necessary supplies and make good the yearly deficit 
in men and money, it was easy enough to counteract the 
evil effects engendered by the attempt to put into prac- 
tice the false theories upon which the enterprise was 
managed. It was even possible, provided the expendi- 
tures were upon a sufficiently lavish scale, to give the 
settlement an appearance of prosperity, as was the case 
with Louisiana from 1717 to 1731, when the Mississippi 



FRENCH DOMINATION. 29 

Company held the charter. But when the time came, 
as sooner or later it did, that the supplies were either 
cut down or withheld altogether, or when from any 
cause they became irregular and uncertain, the sem- 
blance of prosperity disappeared, and the fatal effects of 
this false system of management, in the shape of want 
and its attendant train of evils, began at once to make 
themselves felt. 

Such in brief was the history of Louisiana under 
French domination. Its most prosperous period was 
during the fourteen years that the Company of the 
Indies, or, as it was also called, the Mississippi Com- 
pany, controlled its destinies, and its prosperity then, as 
has been already intimated, was not a healthy growth, 
but was the result of the lavish manner in which sup- 
plies of men and money were poured into the colony 
from abroad. Some idea of the rate at which this was 
done may be gathered from the fact that, during this 
time, the expenses of the colony are said to have been 
upwards of twenty million livres, and that the popula- 
tion was swollen from seven hundred to seven thousand, 
of which number two thousand were negro slaves. 

After the surrender of the charter to the king, in 1731, 
the regular expenses of the colony were reduced to a 
fraction of what they had been during the extravagant 
days of the company, and the population, no longer fed 
by arrivals from abroad, gradually fell off, until, in 
1745, the number of inhabitants was only about six 
thousand, of whom four thousand were whites. Com- 
pared with the previous census, this shows a decrease of 
one thousand whites, the number of negroes remaining 
the same. In all probability this loss was afterwards 
made good, and it is possible that the number of whites 



30 MISSOURI. 

may have been slightly increased over what it was in 
the palmy days of the company, but not to the extent 
claimed by Redan de Passac. According to him, 
Louisiana, in 1763, at the date of the treaty of Paris, 
contained " three thousand French families." Allowing 
four persons to each family, — a liberal allowance, if 
we are to credit the statement as to the age of many of 
the married women, — it would give a total white pop- 
ulation of twelve thousand, which is believed to be much 
too large, as it is more than twice as many as were 
living in Spanish Louisiana in 1766, 1 when probably 
four fifths of all the inhabitants of the colony were on 
that side of the river. 

However, be this as it may, there can be no question 
that, excluding the years in which the budget was swol- 
len by the payment of obligations incurred in prosecut- 
ing the Chickasaw war, there was a marked increase in 
the regular annual expenses from 1731 until the cession 
to Spain in 1762. Thus, for instance, in 1740, the ex- 
penditures were 310,000 livres ; in 1747 they had in- 
creased to 539,000 ; and during the years 1754-56 and 
1759 the average was at the rate of 800,000 livres per 
annum. Probably during the whole of the time that 
Louisiana was a dependency of the crown, it had cost 
not less than from forty to fifty millions of livres (eight 
to ten millions of dollars), and this, of course, inde- 
pendent of the amount paid out by Crozat, and of the 
twenty million livres which the Mississippi Company is 
said to have wasted. 

This was a heavy price to pay for what had thus far 

1 "It had ... in all, five thousand five hundred and fifty-six 
white inhabitants. The blacks were nearly as numerous." Mar- 
tin's History of Louisiana, vol. i. p. 354. New Orleans, 1827. 



FRENCH DOMINATION. 31 

proved to be but an empty honor, and, in the present 
exhausted condition of France, it must soon have be- 
come a serious burden. But even if this had not been 
the case, and the French king had been as able, as he 
seems to have been willing, to preserve his American 
possessions, it was no longer possible for him to do so. 
The fortunes of war were against him. Canada had 
fallen ; and, with Havana in the hands of the English, 
and their ships riding triumphant on the ocean, Louis- 
iana was at their mercy. Under these circumstances, 
his most Christian majesty made a virtue of necessity, 
and, in November, 1762, he transferred the whole of 
that colony to the king of Spain. It was, at best, a gift 
of doubtful value, and the Spanish monarch seems to 
have accepted it somewhat reluctantly, and as a favor to 
France rather than in the hope of deriving any benefit 
from it for himself. 

For reasons that will readily suggest themselves, this 
gift and its acceptance were not made public, the king 
of France continuing to act as if he were still the right- 
ful owner of all that domain. Indeed, in February, 
1763, at the treaty of Paris, he ceded to the English all 
of Louisiana that was east of the Mississippi River, ex- 
cept the city of New Orleans and the island on which it 
was situated, and this in face of the fact that, less than 
six months before, he had presented that very same re- 
gion to his much-loved cousin of Spain. No authorita- 
tive explanation has ever been given of this transaction ; 
but the fact that the king of Spain was a party to the 
treaty, and made no objection to the arrangement by 
which he was deprived of a good part of the colony 
which had been so recently presented to him, affords 
ample grounds for doubting the good faith of the orig- 



32 MISSOURI. 

inal gift. In all probability it was a mere ruse, under 
cover of which the French king hoped to retain some 
portion of his American possessions. 1 

As there were no reasons why the treaty of Paris 
should be kept secret, and no possibility of keeping 
it so, even it if had been desired, its provisions were 
at once made public, and, early in the ensuing spring, 
the people of Louisiana were officially informed of the 
dismemberment of the colony. By this act, the district 
of the Illinois was divided into two unequal parts, all 
on the east side of the Mississippi River being ceded to 
the English. Except the village of Ste. Genevieve, all 
the French settlements in the district were situated 
within this area, including, of course, Fort Chartres, the 
chef -lieu, or seat of justice. 

With the surrender of this important position, " the 
key to the trade of the upper rivers," it became neces- 
sary to select another situation within French, or rather 
Spanish, territory, to which the government of the dis- 
trict might be removed, and which might serve as a 
centre from which the different Indian tribes could be 
furnished with their regular annual supplies. Unfortu- 
nately, however, the colonial treasury was at this time 

1 Under date of May 11, 1763, the Spanish minister, the Mar- 
quis Grimaldi, wrote to the Spanish ambassador at the court of 
France as follows : " M. le due de Praslin (French minister of 
the marine) se rappellera qu'il y eut des doutes de notre part a 
l'egard de 1' acceptation. Mais, comme les m§mes raisons qui 
faisaient eroire a la France la n^cessite* de la cession, conseillaient 
a l'Espagne de 1' accepter, le roi le requt, quoique Ton reconnut 
parfaitement que nous ne faisions l'acquisition que d'une charge 
annuelle de deux cent cinquante mille a trois cent mille piastres, 
en echange d'une utilite* negative et eloigned, c'est-a-dire, celle 
de posseMer un pays pour qu'un autre ne le posse'dat pas." — 
Gayarr^, Histoire de la Louisiane, vol. ii. p. 160. 



FRENCH DOMINATION. 33 

empty. It had neither money nor goods ; and as the 
matter was somewhat urgent, " it was deemed best to 
grant the exclusive trade of the north and northwest- 
ern part of the territory still remaining to a company 
strong enough to manage it and to supply the wants 
of the Indians, and which could make the necessary 
provision for the accommodation of the district gov- 
ernment on the west side of the river." l This was 
done, and the firm of Maxent, Laclede & Co., having 
received the grant, fitted out an expedition, which left 
New Orleans on the 3d of August, 1763, and wintered 
at Fort Chartres. Laclede, or, to give him his true 
name, Pierre Laclede Ligueste, a junior partner in the 
firm, was placed in charge of the expedition, and in the 
exercise of the discretion which seems to have been 
allowed him, he fixed upon the spot where the city of 
St. Louis now stands as the site for the new post. In 
February or March — the date is somewhat uncertain 
— of the ensuing year he sent Auguste Chouteau and a 
band, of workmen to that place with orders to make a 
clearing, and to begin building cabins for the accommo- 
dation of his men and the storage of his goods. In 
good time a number of French families, unwilling to 
abandon the white flag, crossed the river and took up 
their residence at the new post ; and in October, 1765, 
St. Ange de Bellerive, having formally delivered the 
region east of the Mississippi to Captain Sterling, the 
English representative, also removed to that place, and 
St. Louis became the official residence of the command- 
ant, and the chef-lieu of the district. 

1 In this statement I have followed Mr. Oscar W. Collet, whose 
articles upon the early history of Missouri, in the Magazine 
of Western History, and elsewhere, are models of careful re- 
search. 



34 MISSOURI. 

Meanwhile, in October, 1764, the letter of the king 
to Governor d'Abbadie announcing the gift of Louis- 
iana to Spain had been made public, though it was not 
until March, 1766, that Ulloa, the Spanish representa- 
tive, arrived in New Orleans for the purpose of receiv- 
ing the transfer of the colony. He seems to have been 
a worthy sort of man, given to literature and science, 
perhaps, rather than to politics, and to have been actu- 
ated by a sincere desire to discharge his disagreeable 
duties in such a way as to avoid giving offense. In 
this he was disappointed. The people of New Orleans, 
or, to speak more correctly, a portion of them, were not 
to be placated, and they refused to recognize Ulloa's 
authority, though, with curious inconsistency, they did 
not object to the payment of all the expenses of the 
colony by the king whose agent he was. 

After a year or two of ill-concealed strife, Ulloa was 
banished by a decree of the council, dated October 29, 
1768 ; and, singularly enough, one of the main charges 
brought against him was that he had established posts 
and " hoisted the flag of Spain at the Balize, at the 
Illinois," and at some other places. It is difficult, at 
this late day, to understand how this could have been 
construed into a crime against either the French or 
Spanish crown, since it was clearly in the line of his 
duty to his own sovereign, and was done, if not with the 
approval, certainly without any objection on the part of 
the French authorities. It also shows that, outside of 
New Orleans and some other places in that immediate 
neighborhood, the objection to the transfer was neither 
as general nor as inveterate as is sometimes supposed. 
Indeed, on this point there seems to be no room for 
doubt, in view of the official recognition of Ulloa's au- 



FRENCH DOMINATION. 35 

thority by the French governor, and of the fact that the 
commandants of the different districts solicited and ob- 
tained from him a continuation of their respective com- 
mands. That St. Ange was one of these is, we think, 
made clear by the dispatches of Aubry, the Acte cTac- 
cusation, and by his appointment to a position in the 
army of his most Catholic majesty ; and thus it was 
that, although a Frenchman by birth, he became the 
first commandant of upper Louisiana under the Span- 
ish regime. 



CHAPTER III. 

SPANISH DOMINATION. 

A proceeding as revolutionary in its character as 
was the expulsion of Ulloa could not be quietly passed 
over. The Spanish king- could not forget that he had 
accepted Louisiana as a favor to France, and that in so 
doing he had involved himself in a heavy annual outlay 
without the prospect of any immediate return ; and he 
knew very well that the measures complained of were, 
to a very great extent, a legacy from the former govern- 
ment, and that the changes that had been made, by which 
the trade of the colony was transferred from French to 
Spanish ports, were not intended as acts of oppression, 
but were in harmony with the received commercial ideas 
of the day. The hard lesson taught by the revolt of the 
English and Spanish colonies in America had not yet 
been administered ; and it was not until the next gen- 
eration that the different European powers were made 
to understand that the interest, real or supposed, of a 
colony might conflict with that of the mother country, 
and that when such was the case, it was the part of 
a wise political economy to recognize the right of the 
colonists to freedom of action in trade as well as in 
politics. Unable to grasp this truth, and conscious alike 
of the honesty of their own intentions and of the sacri- 
fices which they made in retaining Louisiana, the Spanish 
cabinet looked upon the conduct of the people of New 



SPANISH DOMINATION. 37 

Orleans as being doubly criminal, since it was not only- 
revolutionary in its character, but it also savored strongly 
of ingratitude. As such it was not to be tolerated, 
and they sent O'Reilly to the colony, with a force 
large enough to overcome all opposition. On the 18th 
of August, 1769, he took peaceable possession of New 
Orleans, having found no occasion for the use of his 
troops. During the nine or ten months that had 
elapsed since the banishment of Ulloa, a reaction had 
taken place in the minds of the people, and those who 
had been most active in fomenting the insurrection were 
now among the first to protest their willingness to submit 
to the orders of the king. They even went so far as to 
assert that they had never intended any disrespect to 
him ; and they besought O'Reilly, inasmuch as the revo- 
lution was due to the severity of Ulloa, and to the with- 
drawal of certain privileges which they were pleased 
to say had been guarantied them by the act of cession, 
not to look upon the colony in the light of a con- 
quered province. In spite of these protestations, an 
example was deemed necessary, and twelve of the ring- 
leaders in the conspiracy were tried and condemned. 
Of these, one is said to have died and five were exe- 
cuted. The others were imprisoned, but only for a short 
time, as they were pardoned during the ensuing year, — 
a fact which is not always mentioned by those who have 
seen proper to comment upon the transaction. 

With the execution of these sentences, Spanish justice, 
or vengeance, as it is more often called, was satisfied, 
and O'Reilly now turned his attention to the reorganiza- 
tion of the colonial government. Among other changes, 
he abolished the council, and superseded the French 
code by a set of regulations, based upon the laws of 



38 MISSOURI. 

Castile and the code of the Indies, which he caused to 
be drawn up for the guidance of the judges and other 
officials. At the first glance it would seem as if such 
a wholesale change as this presaged must have been 
productive of no little trouble and inconvenience, but in 
practice it was found not to be the case. The juris- 
prudence of Spain, like that of France, was drawn from 
the Roman code, and the two systems approached each 
other so closely in those particulars in which they touched 
the individual most nearly, that the transition was not 
perceived until it became an accomplished fact. More- 
over, a wide latitude seems to have been allowed in 
the construction and enforcement of these laws. Thus, 
for instance, although Spanish was declared to be the 
official language of the colony, yet the use of French 
was permitted in the judicial and notarial acts of the 
commandants of the several districts ; and in upper 
Louisiana, where the laws of Spain relating to inherit- 
ance, dowry, and grants of land had been published 
and were in force, the coutume de Paris, or, as Bracken- 
ridge calls it, the common law of France, was the system 
by which their contracts were governed ; and he gives 
an instance in which a case, involving the dower right 
of a widow, was decided by a United States court in 
accordance with that law under the " article of cession," 
which provided that respect should be paid to the usages 
and customs which had prevailed in the country. 

For the purpose of facilitating the administration of 
justice, the colony was divided into a number of dis- 
tricts, in each of which a commandant was appointed, 
who was invested with such civil and military powers 
as were thought necessary to the discharge of his duties. 
These officers were generally taken from the army or 



SPANISH DOMINATION. 39 

militia, and as they were paid by the crown, and were, 
as a rule, Frenchmen, it is believed to indicate very 
clearly the kindly feelings by which the Spanish au- 
thorities were animated in their dealings with the col- 
onists. 

In making this division, the settlement of the Illinois, 
or, as we shall now call it, upper Louisiana, was con- 
sidered of too much importance to be classed any 
longer with the districts, and it was constituted into 
a sort of province, separate and distinct from lower 
Louisiana, but in some respects dependent upon it. 
At this time (1769) it had a population of 891, con- 
fined to the villages of St. Louis and Ste. Genevieve ; 
and after 1799, when New Madrid was added, it 
embraced all the region west of the Mississippi and 
north of the latitude of Memphis, once claimed by 
France. Practically, however, except perhaps Dubuque, 
the new settlements within the province, during the 
whole of the Spanish domination, never extended be- 
yond the limits of what is now known as the State of 
Missouri. A lieutenant-governor was placed in com- 
mand, who derived his power directly from the crown, 
though he was obliged to conform to the orders of the 
governor-general, and also of the intendant, after the 
reestablishment of this office in 1794. "As sub-dele- 
gate to the latter, he superintended the finances within 
his jurisdiction, including everything that related to the 
Indians, to commerce, to the sale and grant of lands, 
and to the levy and collection of the public revenue. 
As next in authority to the governor, he commanded the 
military, and chose the commandants and other officers 
of the districts" that were within his province. His 
authority is said to have been without limitation in civil 



40 MISSOURI. 

cases, and it extended to all criminal offenses except 
capital, though his decisions were liable to be reversed 
on appeal to the governor or to the intend ant, each of 
whom had appellate jurisdiction within his appropriate 
sphere. Such appeals, however, were not common, — 
aggravated crimes against the person being so exceed- 
ingly rare that but one case of the murder of a white 
man by a white man is reported in St. Louis during the 
whole period of Spanish rule ; and in civil cases the 
proceedings were of such a character as effectually 
to discourage appeals, save when the object was the 
reversal of erroneous judgments. In case an appeal 
was taken, the person so appealing was obliged to 
pay the opposite party the full amount of the sum 
decreed against him, bond being given to refund the 
sum thus paid, provided the decree was ultimately re- 
versed. To any one accustomed to our system of juris- 
prudence, this method of administering justice will 
appear arbitrary and somewhat summary ; but, taking 
into consideration the times and the character of the 
population, there is much to be said in its favor. Ac- 
cording to Major Stoddard, who was certainly not a 
partial witness, " it created a much greater degree of 
punctuality in the payment of debts than is established 
in any part of the United States." In fact, " the 
change produced by the operation of the laws of the 
United States, the dilatory proceedings of our courts, 
the introduction of the trial by jury, and the expenses 
of legal contests," are said to have given " a temporary 
check to trade and to the credit of merchants, particu- 
larly in upper Louisiana. Experience had led them to 
believe that the Spanish mode of decision, grounded on 
equitable laws, was much the most wise and salutary ; 



SPANISH DOMINATION. 41 

and they murmured at a system calculated to produce 
delays, and in many instances to create expenses equal 
in amount to the sums demanded. They preferred the 
judgment of one man to that of twelve ; and it is but 
justice to observe that the judicial officers were in most 
instances upright and impartial in their decisions." 

In estimating for the expenses of the colony, and in 
the measures which they took to provide the funds to 
meet them, the Spanish government cannot be accused 
of harshness or illiberality. A duty of six per cent., 
amounting, in most prosperous times, to an aggregate 
of one hundred and twenty thousand dollars per annum, 
was levied upon all goods and other articles exported 
or imported ; and this, with the six thousand dollars 
derived from a tax on salaries and legacies and from a 
license for the sale of spirituous liquors, constituted the 
whole of the revenue paid by the colony. No other 
taxes, direct or indirect, were known. Deducting these 
amounts from the average annual expenditure of about 
six hundred and fifty thousand ($650,000) dollars, and 
it will leave in round numbers a deficit of five hundred 
and twenty-five thousand ($525,000) dollars, which was 
made up by a charge of four hundred thousand dollars 
per annum on the Mexican exchequer, and by drafts 
on the royal treasury for the balance. Compared with 
the previous expenses of the colony, even during the 
extravagant days of the Mississippi Company, or with 
the estimates of the Spanish ministry at the time of the 
cession in 1762, this amount seems so out of all propor- 
tion that it is difficult to understand what became of the 
money, without giving credence to some of the stories 
that were current as to the impositions practiced upon 
the king " by exorbitant charges for useless fortifica- 
tions, and for supplies that were never furnished." 



42 MISSOURI. 

Under this mild form of despotism, beneficently ad- 
ministered, life in this portion of the colony moved on 
much as it had done when upper Louisiana formed a 
part of " the district of the Illinois," and was under the 
rule of the French. The nationality of the chief execu- 
tive officer, it is true, was no longer the same ; the chef- 
lieu, too, had been transferred from Fort Chartres to St. 
Louis, and a number of families had removed from the 
east side of the river to the west ; but with these ex- 
ceptions, the cession of this region to Spain had not 
been productive of change. As has been already in- 
timated, the colonists were almost exclusively French 
or of French descent, and naturally enough they clung 
to the customs in which they had been brought up, and 
persisted in the use of the only language with which 
they were familiar. Indeed, situated as they were, it is 
doubtful whether any change could have been effected 
in these particulars even had it been desirable. Except 
in a vague sort of way, they knew of no other mode 
of life than that which they led. Being all related by 
blood or marriage, there were no such things as social 
distinctions among them. The wealthy and intelligent 
received, perhaps, a trifle more consideration, but this 
was a personal compliment, and carried with it no social 
preeminence. In their amusements, as in their labor, 
at church, as at the fireside, they met upon a footing of 
equality. Moreover, they were separated by a thou- 
sand miles of difficult and dangerous travel from their 
neighbors in Quebec and New Orleans, and this, of 
course, deprived them of the healthy stimulus which 
might have come to them from a contrast of their short- 
comings with the progress made by others. Under 
these circumstances, in the little world in which they 



SPANISH DOMINATION. 43 

lived, innovations were rare, and progress was corre- 
spondingly slow. " My father did so before me," was 
regarded as a satisfactory way of accounting for the 
existence of a custom, no matter how inadequate, and it 
usually proved a sufficient answer to any suggestions for 
improvement. 

Such a life may have been narrow, and there can be 
no doubt that, when judged by our standard, these peo- 
ple were illiterate, and except when occasion called for 
exertion, they may have been lazy ; but, on the other 
hand, the men were honest in their dealings and faith- 
ful to their contracts, and the women were, with but few 
exceptions, good wives and true and efficient helpmeets 
to their husbands. It may also be urged in their favor 
that their wants were but few, and as these were easily 
supplied there was no necessity for their working more 
than they did ; and that whilst they did not, perhaps, 
know how to read and write, yet they had a reasonably 
clear idea of the duties and amenities that belonged to 
their condition in life, and were, withal, so prompt in 
practicing them as to extort from Stoddard the some- 
what unwilling admission that they were " apparently 
the happiest people on the globe." 

In a community so shut in, and leading the simple 
sort of life that the people here did, the round of occu- 
pations was necessarily small. A few of the more wealthy 
and enterprising of the inhabitants were engaged in the 
fur-trade and kept small stocks of goods, not displayed 
on shelves and counters, for as yet " there were no open 
shops and stores as in the States," but packed away in 
chests and boxes, to be opened only when the occasion 
called for it. Others, especially among the young and 
adventurous, were employed in the lead mines and in 



44 MISSOURI. 

boating, and a few held positions under the government ; 
but "by far the greater number were engaged in agri- 
culture." In fact, this may be said " to have been, in 
some shape, the business of all," for the surplus produce 
of this portion of the colony was not sufficient to justify 
such a division of labor as would withdraw any num- 
ber of persons, be it ever so small, from the production 
of breadstuffs. 

When not engaged with their crops, some of these 
small farmers " exercised the calling of rough artisans, 
and became blacksmiths, carpenters, stone-masons," etc., 
traveling about from village to village, where their ser- 
vices were needed. At first, there were neither tailors 
nor shoemakers among them, and no baker until about 
1775, when Barrere, who seems to have been the first to 
embark in that business, came from New Orleans and 
established himself in St. Louis. Flour-mills and saw- 
mills, however, they had at an early day, and under 
Governor Delassus, liberal grants of land were made for 
the establishment of distilleries. Of other manufactures 
they had none. If we may credit Brackenridge, there 
was not such a thing as a loom or a spinning-wheel 
then in the province ; 1 and the inhabitants had to de- 
pend upon Europe, not only for such luxuries as " laces," 
but for the materials from which were made the 
" capotes " of the men and the dresses of the women. 
The linsey, or homespun, of the thrifty Kentucky house- 
wife was unknown, and in its place they had two and 
even three-point blankets, calamanco, flannels, etc., which 
they brought, chiefly, from Philadelphia and Baltimore, 

1 Stoddard, however, gives a different account. He says, p. 
305, that ' ' the inhabitants generally cultivated a sufficient quan- 
tity of cotton for family purposes, and spun and wove it into cloth. ' ' 



SPANISff DOMINATION. 45 

and which did not always pass through the custom house. 
Even as simple an article as a churn was not in use, and 
those among them who indulged in the luxury of butter 
made it either " by beating the cream in a bowl or 
shaking it up in a bottle." 

Of money they had but little — far too little to serve 
as a medium of exchange, and in its place peltry, at a 
fixed rate, was made a legal tender in all transactions 
in which it was not stipulated that payment should be 
made in Spanish milled dollars. Lead, too, was used 
in the same way ; in fact, among themselves, all trading 
was done by barter. Even the salaries which the gov- 
ernment paid to the priests, soldiers, and officials were 
advanced by the traders, generally in foreign goods, in 
exchange for bills drawn on the colonial treasury at 
New Orleans. Except the amounts covered by these 
drafts, all other remittances were made in lead, pel- 
try, and provisions. Of the total amount of this trade 
but little is known. The value of the peltries ex- 
ported during the fifteen years next preceding 1804 
is said to have been a trifle over two hundred thou- 
sand dollars ($200,000) per annum ; but this could not 
have been the whole amount, for as early as 1786, the 
English are said to have " seized upon the richest part 
of this trade by ingratiating themselves into the favor of 
the natives that lived on the Des Moines " and elsewhere 
west of the Mississippi. Of the amount of the other 
articles exported, nothing definite is known. All that 
can be said is that the merchants of upper Louisiana 
sent their furs and peltries to Canada and brought back 
such goods as were used in the Indian trade ; that they 
shipped lead and provisions to New Orleans and ex- 
changed them for groceries, and that they obtained their 



46 MISSOURI. 

supplies of other articles from Philadelphia and Balti- 
more in return for lead and salt, which are said to have 
found their way up the Ohio in large quantities. To 
speak of such a people as wanting in enterprise, or to 
call the hardy voyagers on these " wild and wicked " 
western rivers lazy, as is not unfrequently done, indi- 
cates a confusion of ideas and terms that can hardly 
be reconciled with truth and fairness. 

As land had no value unless it was improved, the 
wealth of the colonists consisted principally in personal 
property, slaves being regarded as its most desirable 
form. For the same reason rent was virtually unknown. 
Every head of a family was entitled to a house-lot in 
the village proper, to as much of the common field as 
he could cultivate, and to the right of pasturage on the 
village common. In return for these advantages, he 
was required to keep up his part of the " common " 
fence, to aid in road making, and bear his share of any 
other improvements which the villagers, at their regular 
annual town meeting, should order to be made. Under 
such a system there was no inducement to acquire any 
more land than was absolutely necessary ; and although 
concessions, embracing hundreds and even thousands of 
acres of fertile lands, could be had for the asking, it 
was not until towards the close of the century, when 
immigrants from the States began to pour into the prov- 
ince, that land took on a recognized value, and that 
" the principal inhabitants began to open plantations at 
some little distance from the town," and to cultivate 
them after the English- American fashion. " As a con- 
sequence, passengers," we are told, " could now go 
through the streets without danger of being jostled by 
horses, cows, hogs, and oxen, which formerly crowded 
them." 



SPANISH DOMINATION. 47 

Of politics they knew but little and cared less. It 
was the commandant's business, so they thought, to look 
after " all that sort of thing," and consequently they 
did not allow it to trouble them. Neither did they con- 
cern themselves, to any extent, about education. As 
early as 1772, a school was ordered to be established in 
New Orleans, and a director was sent out, together with 
three teachers, one of grammar, another of Latin, and a 
third of reading and writing. The parents, however, 
were not anxious to secure the benefits " which the 
magnanimous heart of his Majesty had put within their 
reach" for their children, and they failed to send them 
to the school. Not a single pupil, we are told, ever pre- 
sented himself for the Latin class ; and those who came 
to be taught reading and writing were but few in num- 
ber and uncertain in their attendance. In 1788, the 
school-house was burned down, when a certain Don 
Andres Almonaster, to his honor be it said, offered a 
small " edifice, containing a room thirteen feet in length 
by twelve in width, which would suffice for the present," 
and might be used until he could build another, which 
he proposed to do at a cost to himself of six thousand 
dollars. The Ursuline convent at New Orleans was 
also in receipt of his Majesty's bounty to the amount of 
six hundred dollars per annum ; but in no other part of 
the colony was there any provision made for what may 
be termed public education, nor was there any legal 
ordinance on the subject. In St. Louis and Ste. Ge- 
nevieve private schools, in which children were taught 
reading, writing, and a little arithmetic, were occasionally 
established, but they were usually of short duration, and 
produced no good or lasting effect in the society at large. 
The great mass of the people were unable to avail of 



48 MISSOURI. 

even these scanty advantages. Numbers of them " could 
not read or write their names," and yet we are assured, 
on the authority of educated travelers, that "their 
manners were easy, their conversation pleasant and 
often instructive, and many of them manifested extraor- 
dinary natural endowments." It is but just to add that 
some of the more wealthy sent their sons to Canada to 
be educated, and that there were among them a few 
gradifates from European universities. 

But whilst the great majority of the people were thus 
illiterate, and careless about political and educational 
matters, they were by no means neglectful of their reli- 
gious concerns or their amusements. The ceremonies and 
festivals of the church occupied not a little of their lei- 
sure, and they seem to have been much given to cards, 
billiards, and other games, as well as to balls and assem- 
blies. These latter usually took place on Sunday after- 
noon, after vespers, and instead of being scenes of frivol- 
ity they were " schools of manners," where the children 
were taught " the essence of politeness and self-denial." 
When questioned as to what seemed to their Protestant 
neighbors like a desecration of the day they would an- 
swer : " That men were made for happiness, and that 
the more they are able to enjoy themselves, the more 
acceptable they are to their Creator. They are of opin- 
ion that a sullen countenance, an attention to gloomy 
subjects, a set form of speech, and a stiff behavior are 
more indicative of hypocrisy than of religion ; and they 
have often remarked that those who practice these sin- 
gularities will most assuredly cheat and defraud their 
neighbors during the rest of the week. Such," it is said, 
" are the religious sentiments of a people void of supersti- 
tion ; of a people prone to hospitality, urbanity of man- 



SPANISH DOMINATION. 49 

ners, and innocent recreation ; and who present their 
daily orisons at the throne of grace with as much con- 
fidence of success as the most devout Puritans in ex- 
istence." 

Of course they were all Catholics ; but whilst great 
sticklers for their own form of worship, they were not 
disposed to interfere with the religious rights of others. 
In this they were far more liberal than were their laws. 
Thus, when the Holy Office endeavored to gain a footing 
in New Orleans. Governor Miro arrested the would-be 
inquisitor and shipped him back to Spain ; and when, a 
few years later, in upper Louisana, that sturdy Baptist, 
Abraham Music, asked leave to " hold meeting " at his 
house, Governor Trudeau is said to have answered : 
" It cannot be granted, as it is a violation of law. 
What I mean," he added, " is that you must not put a 
bell on your house and call it a church, nor suffer any 
one to christen your children but the parish priest ; but 
if any of your friends choose to meet at your house, sing, 
pray, and talk about religion, you will not be molested, 
provided you continue, as I suppose you are, good Catho- 
lics." The worthy governor knew that, as Baptists, they 
did not believe in infant baptism, and that they did not 
need the sound of a bell to show them the way to " meet- 
ing." 

In a community so constituted, and under the rule of 
officers who were instructed to " maintain tranquillity and 
contentment among the inhabitants," and to cultivate 
friendly relations with their neighbors, red as well as 
white, there was but little to disturb the tranquil flow of 
what may, by courtesy, be termed public affairs. In fact, 
the records of the province contain but little save grants 
of land in the village and common fields, notices of the 



50 MISSOURI. 

sales of the property of deceased persons, transcripts of 
deeds and wills, and occasionally an account of a suit 
for debt or slander. Even the coming and going of 
the lieutenant-governors is not unfrequently a matter of 
inference, to be determined by the date of the documents 
to which their signatures are attached. " In spite, how- 
ever, of the simple character of these records, tradition 
has preserved a few events that were regarded as being 
of sufficient importance to be perpetuated, and it may be 
well enough to glance briefly at some of them, more by 
way of showing the character of the occurrences that 
were thought worthy of commemoration, than for any 
influence which they had in shaping the destiny of the 
province. 

Thus we find that, in 1770, St. Ange gave place as 
lieutenant-governor to Piernas. He, in turn, was fol- 
lowed in 1775 by Cruzat, and in 1778 by De Leyba, 
who remained in office until his death in 1780, when 
Cruzat was sent to the province for the second time, 
and held the command until 1787. 

During these different administrations, which cover 
rather more than half the period of Spanish domination, 
the revolt of the English colonies, or, as it is called, the 
American Revolution, took place ; and although it was 
indirectly fraught with important consequences to lower 
Louisiana and the Spanish crown, yet its influence 
seems hardly to have been felt in the portion of the col- 
ony with which we have to deal. Indeed, it only inter- 
ests us so far as the capture, in 1778, of Kaskaskia and 
Cahokia by the Virginians, under General George Rogers 
Clark, and the presence of these troops on the east side 
of the river in the spring of 1780 can be said to have 
contributed to the defeat of the invasion which tradition 



SPANISH DOMINATION. 51 

has magnified into an attack upon St. Louis, and which 
has caused the year 1780 to pass into local history as 
Vannee die coup, the year of the attack. 

According to the account handed down by Stoddard, 
the British governor at Michilimackinac anxious to pre- 
vent the invasion of Florida by Governor Galvez of Lou- 
isiana, sought to create a diversion by sending a force of 
150 white men and 1,500 Indians down the Mississippi 
for the purpose of attacking St. Louis. No direct as- 
sault was made upon the village, but during the short 
time that the hostile troops were in the neighborhood a 
number — some accounts say as many as sixty — of the 
inhabitants were killed and thirty taken prisoners. This 
is the story as it is usually told, and in the main it 
is correct, except in the number of killed and prison- 
ers, which is greatly exaggerated. Another version of 
the affair represents " the attack " as having been 
brought about by a Canadian Frenchman named Du- 
charme, in revenge for the loss of his goods, which had 
been confiscated by the Spanish authorities because he 
was caught trading with the Indians of the Missouri. 
In this account, also, there is an element of truth, for 
Ducharme's goods had been seized, and he was engaged 
in the invasion. It is even intimated that it was owing, 
in part, to his treachery that the expedition proved a 
failure. 

Recent investigations have thrown additional light 
upon this subject ; and it now appears that whilst it was 
expected that the posts which had been taken by Clark 
would be recaptured, yet the expedition, as planned in 
London, was a part of a comprehensive movement which 
had for its object the expulsion of the Spaniards from 
the Mississippi valley. Having captured St. Louis and 



52 MISSOURI. 

the other villages in that neighborhood, these troops were 
to proceed down the river and cooperate with an Eng- 
lish force from below in an attack upon New Orleans 
and the Spanish settlements on the lower Mississippi. 
It was a magnificent scheme, but, unfortunately for its 
success, the Spaniards and Americans in the valley 
learned of it almost as soon as the English, and they at 
once took measures to defeat it. In lower Louisiana, 
Governor Galvez, without waiting to be attacked, raised 
a force and took Natchez, Baton Rouge, and other Eng- 
lish posts on the Mississippi ; whilst in Illinois, the in- 
vaders found the Virginians under Clark so well pre- 
pared that they did not dare to attack them. For this 
reason, and owing also, it is said, to the treachery of Calve 
and Ducharme, the expedition was broken up and re- 
turned homewards, though not until " twenty Canadians 
and a very few traders and servants had made an attack 
upon Pencour " — Pain court — St. Louis, in the course 
of which, according to the report of Lieutenant-Governor 
Sinclair, " 68 were killed, and 18 blacks and white peo- 
ple taken prisoners." 

This is probably the truth of the affair, except as to 
the number of killed and prisoners, and we have dwelt 
upon it at some length for the reason that it exemplifies 
the difficulties that attend an investigation into the his- 
tory, or rather the traditions, of the province, and be- 
cause it is the only instance in which these settlements 
were ever seriously threatened by a hostile force. Un- 
doubtedly there are numerous statements in the early 
records as to the depredations committed by the Indians, 
and it cannot be denied that, on more than one occa- 
sion, they murdered a settler and were guilty of other 
acts of hostility ; but, as a rule, these outrages are be- 



SPANISH DOMINATION. 53 

lieved to have been the work of individual savages on 
horse-stealing expeditions, and not the result of any 
concerted tribal action. The fact that the French al- 
ways lived in compact villages and not on separate 
farms, in exposed positions, as was often the case with 
the English-American pioneers, insured them a certain 
amount of protection from Indian attacks ; and when, a 
few years later, bands of Shawnees, Delawares, and other 
tribes were brought westward and established on res- 
ervations, where they served as a barrier between the 
whites and their troublesome neighbors the Osages, this 
comparative immunity was converted into an absolute 
guarantee against all danger from that quarter. Indeed, 
it is questionable whether, even without these precau- 
tions, there would have been any very serious risk, for 
the reason that the Spanish government, in all its deal- 
ings with the Indians of the Mississippi valley, seems 
to have been actuated by a sense of humanity that was 
in advance of the times ; and because the officials of 
upper Louisiana, in their treatment of these people, 
were ordered to pursue a policy that was at once just 
and conciliatory in its character. Instead of enslaving 
them, O'Reilly, in 1770, notified the inhabitants of Lou-, 
isiana that they would have to prepare for the emancipa- 
tion of those who were already in bondage ; and so far 
from trying to dispossess them of their lands and drive 
them off, the French, and after them the Spaniards, en- 
deavored to make use of them as hunters and small far- 
mers, and to this end they did not hesitate to establish 
them, so far as they were able, in permanent settlements 
close to their own villages, as was the case at Kaskaskia, 
Ste. Genevieve, and other places. That such a course of 
conduct bore good fruit is well known to every student 



54 MISSOURI. 

of border history; and it is not therefore improbable 

that the contrast between this method of treatment and 

that pursued by the English-American colonists may 

have given rise to the indignant remonstrance which a 

Shawnee chief is said to have addressed to General 

Harrison : " You call us your children," said he ; " why 

do you not make us happy, as our fathers the French 

did ? They never took from us our lands ; indeed, they 

were in common between us. They planted where they 

pleased, and they cut wood where they pleased, and so 

did we. But now, if a poor Indian attempts to take a 

little bark from a tree to cover him from the rain, up 

comes a white man and threatens to shoot him, claiming 

the tree as his own." Only on one occasion does there 

appear to have been a prospect of a war between these 

colonists and the Indians, and that was settled in such 

a curious manner that the story would not be credible, 

were it not vouched for by as trustworthy an authority 

as Major Stoddard. According to him, during a sort of 

predatory war which, in 1794, raged between the whites 

and a tribe of Missouri Indians, a chief, with a party of 

his warriors, boldly entered St. Louis and demanded an 

• interview with Governor Trudeau, to whom he said : 

" We have come to offer you peace ; we have been at 

war with you many moons, and what have we done ? 

Nothing. Our warriors have tried every means to meet 

yours in battle ; but you will not, you dare not fight us ; 

you are a parcel of old women. What can be done 

with such a people but make peace, since you will not 

fight ? I come therefore to offer you peace, and to bury 

the hatchet, to brighten the chain and again to open the 

way between us." The Spanish governor, it is added, 

was obliged to bear the insult, but there was no war. 



SPANISH DOMINATION. 55 

The Indians, however, were not the only people against 
whom it was necessary to be on the watch. The recent 
incursion, though a failure, showed the possibility of an 
invasion by the English from Canada, and, accordingly, 
Cruzat, with the view of guarding against an attack from 
that direction, caused St. Louis to be fortified on the land 
side by a stockade, to which in after years was added 
sundry stone towers, a demi-lune, and a bastion. As 
against any force which the Indians could bring, these 
defenses were sufficient, though fortunately, perhaps, for 
the villagers their strength was never tested by the use 
of cannon. 

During the remainder of Cruzat's term there was but 
little to note. A census taken in 1785 gives the- total 
population of the province at about fifteen hundred ; and 
in this same year there was a freshet in the Mississippi 
which obliged the inhabitants of Ste. Genevieve to aban- 
don the site of the " old " village, and to remove to the 
situation which the town now occupies, on higher ground. 
It was a memorable event in the annals of the colony, 
and gave to the year the significant title of Vannee des 
grands eaux, the year of the high water. 

In 1787, called Vannee des dix batteaux, from the ar- 
rival at one time of ten boats from New Orleans, Perez 
came into office ; and it was during his administration 
that bands of the Shawnees, Delawares, etc., driven back 
by the advance of the whites across the Alleghany Moun- 
tains, were induced to forsake their homes in the region 
north of the Ohio, and to establish themselves upon the 
lands which had been granted them in the neighborhood 
of Cape Girardeau, Ste. Genevieve, and the other villages 
on the Spanish side of the Mississippi. Here they were 
permitted to remain for some thirty-five years ; and it is 



56 MISSOURI. 

a sad commentary upon our treatment of these people 
that when, in 1825, they were called on to remove still 
farther westward, the improvements which they left be- 
hind them are said to have compared not unfavorably 
with those of the average of their white neighbors. On 
the expiration of Perez's term of office in 1793, Trudeau 
was appointed, and in 1799 he was succeeded by Delas- 
sus, a Frenchman by descent, if not by birth, who was 
the last lieutenant-governor of upper Louisiana under 
the Spanish regime, as St. Ange, another Frenchman, had 
been the first. 

Under these two administrations, which embrace the 
last decade of Spanish rule in the Mississippi valley, 
there were a few events, as for instance the " hard win- 
ter " of 1798-99, the prevalence of " the small-pox " in 
1801, and some others, which have been commemorated 
in the peculiar fashion of these villagers, but to which it 
is unnecessary to do more than refer, as, however impor- 
tant they may have appeared at the time, they were 
without any influence in shaping the future of the col- 
ony, and are, therefore, of but little moment when com- 
pared with the increase of population which took place 
during this period, and with the total change in its 
character. 

To appreciate the full significance of these facts, it is 
necessary to bear in mind that the first settlers in this 
province were emigrants from Fort Chartres, Kaskaskia, 
and the other villages on the Illinois side of the river ; 
that they were almost exclusively French or of French 
descent, and that for twenty years or more, in spite of 
the gradual increase in population, this distinct national 
character was maintained. Even as late as 1788, if we 
may judge from the village records, the registers of 



SPANISH DOMINATION. 57 

deaths and marriages, there were but few of the two 
thousand inhabitants that were then credited to the prov- 
ince who had not sprung from this stock. About this 
time, however, two events occurred, which, by turning in 
this direction a fair share of the emigration from " the 
States," increased the population of the province so rap- 
idly, and wrought such a change in its character, that, in 
1799, it amounted to six thousand, and in 1803 to about 
ten thousand, of which number three fifths, or six thou- 
sand, were English-Americans. 

The first in time, and perhaps the more important of 
the causes which contributed to this result, was the adop- 
tion by Congress of the Ordinance of 1787, prohibiting 
slavery in the region north of the Ohio and south of 
the Lakes. This ordinance, it will be remembered, was 
passed by a vote of five slave and three free States, and 
although it was intended to be prospective in its action, 
yet its immediate practical effect was to deter those who 
owned slaves from settling in the region to which it ap- 
plied. It also led some of those who had already estab- 
lished themselves in that region, and who were desirous 
of retaining that kind of property in their families, to 
take up their residence on the other side of the Missis- 
sippi, where the conditions were such as to enable them 
to carry out this wish. Powerful as this motive must 
have been in turning the attention of slaveholding emi- 
grants in this direction, its influence was vastly increased, 
and its effect hastened, by the necessity which, in 1796, 
the Spanish authorities conceived themselves to be under 
of strengthening the people of upper Louisiana, so that 
they might be able to defend themselves against a threat- 
ened invasion of the English from Canada. To enable 
them to do this successfully, it was thought necessary to 



58 MISSOURI. 

increase their numbers ; and hence the great induce- 
ments which were held out to emigrants, especially to 
those from the United States, as it was thought that 
their hostility to the English would prove a guarantee 
of their fidelity to Spain. Accordingly, lands were 
freely granted to all settlers, attended with no other ex- 
penses than those of surveys and office fees. A farm 
of 800 acres could be obtained for forty-one dollars, 
exclusive of the amounts paid to the chainmen and for 
the confirmation of the title at New Orleans. Even these 
payments were not necessary to give possession. This 
was certainly little enough ; and when we add that every 
such concession might be made to cover a lead mine, and 
that there was practically no such thing in the province 
as taxation, it will be seen that the temptation to emi- 
grate was of a character that the average pioneer from 
Kentucky and Tennessee would find it difficult to resist. 
A less attractive prize had lured Boone and men of his 
stamp across the Alleghanies, and it was therefore but 
natural that, being unable to find their places in the 
new order of things which they saw growing up around 
them, they should yield to the tempting offers of the 
Spanish authorities, and cross the Mississippi in search 
of the homes which they had failed to find in regions 
farther to the east. 

In this connection, it is worthy of note, and the fact 
certainly redounds to the credit of the Spanish govern- 
ment, that when making these grants, they practically 
showed no discrimination in favor of Catholics as against 
Protestants. In 1790 the king had given orders that 
the settlers were not to be disturbed in the exercise 
of their religion ; in 1797, the land laws of Gayoso, 
narrow and bigoted as they were in some respects, al- 



SPANISH DOMINATION. 59 

lowed liberty of conscience for the first generation of 
emigrants to lower Louisiana ; and in the upper part 
of the colony, as we have seen, the officials conven- 
iently ignored the regulations that interfered with emi- 
gration, including those that bore heavily upon all 
who did not belong to the established church. In fact, 
there is reason to believe that as early as 1788, Gardo- 
qui, the Spanish minister at Philadelphia, in the conces- 
sion which he made to Colonel Morgan of some millions 
of acres in the New Madrid district, not only granted the 
prospective colonists the right of self-government, but 
also freedom of religious worship. This concession, it is 
true, was not sanctioned by Governor Miro, and it was 
therefore inoperative ; but the fact that it was granted 
is proof of the growing liberality of the Spanish authori- 
ties, and of the free and easy manner in which the laws of 
the colony were interpreted. In refusing to confirm this 
grant, Governor Miro refers to the fact that it would have 
created an independent republic within Louisiana, and 
says : " The circumstance of their governing themselves 
whilst the king should pay the magistrates would attract 
here a prodigious multitude of people . . . who would, 
on the slightest provocation, declare themselves indepen- 
dent, and, what is worse, having the free use of their re- 
spective religions, they would never become Catholics." 
With grim humor, the worthy governor adds, that " on 
such conditions he would undertake to depopulate the 
greater part of the United States, and draw all their 
citizens to Louisiana, including the whole Congress it- 
self." 

With the incoming tide of emigration, there was a 
marked change in the values of certain kinds of prop- 
erty. Land which had heretofore been held in little 



60 MISSOURI. 

esteem was now eagerly sought after ; and all who were 
entitled to concessions solicited and obtained them. 
Among those who were thus fortunate were " most of 
the French inhabitants," and also those officials who 
were entitled to compensation, and whose services, in 
accordance with Spanish custom, were rewarded by 
grants of lands instead of by gifts of money. A few 
of these concessions were on a large scale, embracing a 
league square or more of land, but the great majority 
of them were far from extravagant ; and yet so numer- 
ous were they that, according to Major Stoddard, " the 
quantity of land claimed in upper Louisiana under 
French and Spanish titles, amounted to one million 
seven hundred and twenty-one thousand four hundred 
and ninety-three (1,721,493) arpents, a quantity " which, 
we are told, " was not exorbitant when compared with 
the population of the province." 

Of these grants, some were general and others special ; 
and the titles which they conveyed were either complete 
or incomplete. The concessions were general when 
they could be located upon any portion of the public 
domain that was not taken up, and they were special 
when they were designated by certain metes and bounds. 
When the grant was derived directly from the crown, 
or when it was sanctioned by the regularly constituted 
authority at New Orleans, the title which it conveyed 
was said to be complete ; but when the concession was 
based upon a " naked grant " of the lieutenant-governor 
or of a commandant, and had not received the approval 
of the proper officers at New Orleans, it was incom- 
plete. Nineteen twentieths of the titles belonged to the 
latter or incomplete class, and this gave rise to much 
trouble and litigation before the evil was finally reme- 



SPANISH DOMINATION. 61 

died. Congress, however, set to work to accomplish 
it, and though it took a good many years and several 
acts, yet, thanks to the liberal policy which was adopted, 
it is probable that there were but few bond fide grants 
made by the French and Spanish authorities that were 
not ultimately confirmed. 

Such, in brief, is the history of upper Louisiana 
under Spanish domination, and the picture which it pre- 
sents of the condition of the inhabitants at the close of 
the eighteenth century. This picture, it will be observed, 
is not sketched from materials furnished by the colo- 
nists themselves, but is made up from accounts given 
by those who, however favorably disposed towards them, 
were, with but few exceptions, either ignorant of what 
was really meritorious in the Spanish form of govern- 
ment, or were so hostile to it as to be able to see but little 
that was good in any of its measures. In either event, 
they were but poorly qualified for the work which they 
had in hand ; and yet, in spite of the prejudice which 
occasionally crops out even in trustworthy writers like 
Stoddard and Brackenridge, it is evident to any one 
who will take the trouble to read between the lines, that 
these people had attained to a degree of mental, material, 
and political progress which compared not unfavorably 
with the early stages of existence in the communities on 
the other side of the Mississippi. All things consid- 
ered, it is safe to say that, so far as the acts of the 
constituted authorities could or did affect the lives of 
the colonists, they had nothing to learn from their 
English-American neighbors. They did not, it is true, 
have to pay as much for their homes and farms, contrib- 
ute out of their scanty earnings to the maintenance of 
the priests, or of the magistrates for whom they had but 



62 MISSOURI. 

little use ; neither were they called on to tax themselves 
to any great extent for the support of the government. 
They had even managed to get along quite comfortably 
without the introduction of the trial by jury ; and, what 
some of the early writers find it difficult to understand, 
they regarded these exemptions as positive advantages. 
Whether, alone and unaided, they could have edu- 
cated themselves to a contrary way of thinking, is a 
question which we are not called upon to consider. 
Such a thing is possible ; and it is even possible that 
the English-American settlers who had crossed the Mis- 
sissippi to escape taxation and in pursuit of cheap lands 
might have been foolish enough to revolutionize the 
province, as they were abundantly able to do, for the 
purpose of reincurring the obligations which such a 
course would have imposed ; but there is no reason for 
thinking they would have done so, though the contrary 
has been often asserted and is generally believed. All 
that we are permitted to know about the matter is that 
the settlers were so well satisfied with their form of gov- 
ernment, and with their mode of life, that the transfer 
of the colony, in 1804, to the United States was a source 
of undisguised regret to a great majority of the Creoles, 
and that the English- American portion of the population 
was neither unanimous nor enthusiastic in its favor. 1 

1 " Indeed, few of the French and part of the English- Ameri- 
cans only were at first reconciled to the change, though they 
never manifested any discontent." — Stoddard, Sketches of Louis- 
iana, p. 311. Philadelphia, 1812. 



CHAPTER IV. 

THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE. 

In seeking for the causes that led to the treaties of 
1800 and 1803, by which Louisiana was " retroceded " 
to France and subsequently sold by that power to the 
United States, it will be necessary to glance briefly at 
the political condition of Western Europe as it then was, 
and to note the steps by which the English colonies 
along the Atlantic coast had become welded into the 
United States of America, and had extended their wes- 
tern boundary to the Mississippi River. 

By the first of these treaties, known to history as the 
treaty of St. Ildefonso, and concluded on the 1st of Oc- 
tober, 1800, France came into possession of Louisiana 
with "the same limits that it now has in the hands 
of Spain, that it had when France possessed it, and such 
as it ought to have after the treaties subsequently en- 
tered into between Spain and other powers." Ostensi- 
bly this retrocession was made in return for the province 
of Tuscany, which was to be erected into a kingdom 
under the name of Etruria and handed over to the Duke 
of Parma, one of the Spanish princes ; but in reality, 
it was the result of a complication of affairs in which 
Spain can hardly be said to have been a willing actor. 
Under any circumstances, such a cession involved a 
sacrifice of pride and prestige which must have been 
exceedingly distasteful to a proud and haughty people, 



64 MISSOURI. 

and in the present instance, it was made more objection- 
able by the fact that, in many quarters, it was regarded 
as a military and political blunder. By some inexplic- 
able process, the Spanish authorities had persuaded 
themselves that Louisiana might be made a sort of bul- 
wark to their Mexican possessions, and hence the tenac- 
ity with which they clung to it although it had already 
brought them to the brink of a war with the United 
States, and although it must, if the policy of closing 
the Mississippi to the people of the Ohio valley were 
persisted in, inevitably hasten the very result which 
they were anxious to avoid. For these reasons, then, 
among others, it is permitted us to believe that the court 
of Madrid was not anxious to part with Louisiana, and 
that it would not have agreed to do so, but for the 
pressure which Bonaparte knew so well how to bring 
to bear upon all who were in positions to help or hinder 
his designs. 

At this time, he was in the full flush of his Italian 
triumphs. He had just been made First Consul for ten 
years, and he was intent upon schemes for advancing 
France to a position in naval and commercial affairs 
which would be commensurate with the military su- 
premacy he had reasserted for her on land. To do this, 
colonies were regarded as absolutely essential, and these 
France did not have. The ill-advised emancipation of 
the slaves in Hayti had handed over that flourishing 
island to Toussaint L'Ouverture and the party of the 
blacks, as distinguished from that of the whites or the 
mulattoes ; and of all her other possessions in Asia 
and America, the English had left her but little that 
was worth having. The outlook was not favorable, but 
the First Consul, in nowise daunted by the prospect, 



THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE. 65 

made up his mind to reconquer Hayti on the first op* 
portunity, and by way of furnishing that colony with a 
depot from which to draw supplies of " provisions, cattle, 
and wood," he determined to reclaim Louisiana. 

In the condition in which France then was, such a 
course would, to-day, be looked upon as suicidal, but at 
that time it was regarded as sound policy by not a few 
of those who controlled the destinies of Europe. Even 
the First Consul himself, far-sighted as he was, seems 
only to have caught a glimpse of the truth, recognized 
everywhere twenty five years later, that a distant colony 
was " an element of weakness to a people who could be 
shut out from the sea on the outbreak of every maritime 
war." There were other considerations of a personal 
character, that had their weight in leading him to adopt 
this course. He knew very well that the family compact 
of 1762, by which Louisiana had been ceded to Spain, 
was considered a great mistake by the merchants of 
France, and he was satisfied that he could count upon 
their support in any efforts he might make to recover 
it. He seems also to have had a vague notion that the 
possession of the mouth of the Mississippi would enable 
him to exert a pressure upon the people of the Ohio 
valley which would, with a little judicious management, 
bend them to his will and thus give him a potential voice 
in North American affairs. But even if it did not come 
up to his expectations in each and every one of these 
particulars, he fancied that in some possible contingency 
it might furnish him with a base of operations from 
which he could threaten the English colonies in Canada 
or the West Indies ; and if the occasion should ever 
arise, it would afford him a position from which he could 
seize Mexico and the Spanish possessions in Central 



66 MISSOURI. 

America. Besides these advantages, which were rather 
prospective than real, he hoped to find here the means 
of rewarding the officers and soldiers whom the peace 
had thrown out of employment, and he also saw in it a 
safe and convenient outlet for certain turbulent spirits 
whom he might wish to keep at a distance from France. 

Influenced by these considerations, he took occasion 
to open negotiations with the Spanish cabinet upon this 
subject ; and skillfully availing himself of the critical 
condition of the relations which then existed between 
Spain and the United States, he found no difficulty in 
convincing the Spanish minister that it was to the in- 
terest of his country to retrocede Louisiana to France. 
France, it was urged, was the friend and ally of Spain, 
and in her hands Louisiana would be a protection to 
Mexico, and not a source of danger, as it now was. 
Powerful as this motive must have been, it was supple- 
mented by the fact that the prevailing opinion at Mad- 
rid, at that time, seems to have been that she would 
prove a less dangerous neighbor than the United States, 
as she was not a colonizing power, the experience of a 
hundred and fifty years having demonstrated her in- 
ability to maintain a successful continental possession. 
Unquestionably these considerations had their weight, 
and backed, as they were, by the imperious will and vic- 
torious legions of Bonaparte, they were too powerful to 
be resisted. Accordingly, on the 1st of October, 1800, 
the treaty of St. Ildefonso was concluded, and Louisiana 
became once more a French colony. 

Thus far, everything had gone on smoothly. Spain 
had given her consent to the retrocession, somewhat 
unwillingly, perhaps, but still she had given it ; and thus 
by the mere stroke of a pen, the First Consul had 



THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE. 67 

acquired a clear title to a domain far more extensive 
than France itself. To take possession of it, however, 
was quite a different matter, and this was the lesson 
which he was now to learn. England was the mistress 
of the seas, and not only was it impossible for a French 
fleet to move without her permission, but it was quite 
within her power, in case the cession of Louisiana be- 
came known, to land a force at New Orleans and seize 
the colony before it had been formally transferred to its 
new owners. Under these circumstances, the high con- 
tracting parties found it necessary to move very cau- 
tiously ; and hence the attempt to keep the terms of the 
treaty and even its existence a secret, until the peace of 
Amiens once more gave the French the free run of the 
ocean, and made it possible for the First Consul to pro- 
ceed openly in the execution of his plans for colonial 
aggrandizement. When, therefore, in the autumn of 
1801, the preliminaries of that peace were agreed upon 
in London, he at once took advantage of the opportunity 
and began secretly to make arrangements for the occu- 
pation of Hayti and Louisiana. With the expedition 
sent to Hayti, we are not concerned. It sailed in the 
winter of 1801-2, before the conclusion of the definitive 
treaty of peace in the March following, and except in 
so far as the difficulties and disasters which it encoun- 
tered may have influenced the First Consul in his deter- 
mination to part with Louisiana, it does not come within 
the scope of our investigation. 

The second of these expeditions — the one intended 
to take possession of Louisiana — was organized during 
the ensuing summer and with the same secrecy, but its 
departure was delayed by a misunderstanding as to the 
interpretation of the treaty of St. Ildefonso, France con- 



68 MISSOURI. 

tending that the Floridas were included in the act of 
cession, whilst Spain maintained that they were not. 
When, at length, after some months of contention, this 
point was settled, another year had rolled around, and 
the relations between France and England had become 
so strained that the order for the expedition to sail was 
countermanded, and the troops that had been intended 
to occupy Louisiana and garrison New Orleans were 
assigned to other duties. 

In the mean time, notwithstanding the secrecy with 
which the terms of this treaty had been guarded, its 
purport was generally suspected in diplomatic circles. 
In March, 1801, Mr. Rufus King, the American minis- 
ter to England, informed Mr. Secretary Madison of the 
rumors that were afloat on the subject, and Mr. R. R. 
Livingston was at once sent to Paris, with instructions to 
protest against a measure which was justly regarded as 
being; hostile to the interests of the United States, inas- 
much as it placed a strong military power at the mouth 
of the Mississippi, instead of a weak one as Spain then 
was. This vigorous action brought the United States 
prominently forward, and there can be no doubt that it 
was their hostility to the measure, joined to the warlike 
attitude assumed by England some months later, that 
determined the First Consul to make a virtue of neces- 
sity and sell a colony which he could not hope to retain, 
even if he were permitted to take possession of it. 

To understand the part which the United States were 
henceforth to play in this transaction and the reasons 
for it, we shall have to take a retrospective glance, and 
note briefly the steps which had brought them to the 
Mississippi River, and to the very doors of New Orleans. 
In doing this it will not be necessary to go back of the 



THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE. 69 

treaty of 1763, by which, as we have already seen, 
France divided the possessions which she held upon the 
mainland of North America, between Great Britain and 
Spain, — all on the east side of the Mississippi, except 
the city of New Orleans and the island on which it is 
situated, being ceded to the former power, whilst the 
latter gained New Orleans and all of Louisiana that 
was situated west of that river. At the same time, 
Spain surrendered Florida in return for Havana which 
had been recently taken from her, so that, by virtue of 
these treaties, Great Britain was now the sole owner of 
all of North America east of the Mississippi, except the 
small triangle at the mouth of the river, which is 
bounded by the Mississippi on one side, the Gulf on 
another, and by the Iberville and Lakes Maurepas and 
Pontchartrain on the third or north. 

In the same year in which she came into possession 
of all this broad domain, Great Britain divided Florida 
into two provinces, which were called, respectively, East 
and West Florida. At first the northern limit of West 
Florida was fixed at a line extending from the Missis- 
sippi to the Appalachicola along the 31st degree of north 
latitude ; but shortly after, in order to expedite the 
administration of justice in the Natchez district, a strip, 
a hundred miles and more in width, along its entire 
northern boundary, was added to West Florida, thus ex- 
tending its limits in that direction to a line drawn due 
east from the mouth of the Yazoo River to the Chatta- 
hoochee, one of the main branches of the Appalachi- 
cola. 

Such was the condition of affairs when the revolt of the 
thirteen American colonies made another revision of the 
map necessary. By the treaty of 1783 between Great 



70 MISSOURI. 

Britain on the one part and the United States and her 
allies, France and Spain, on the other, Great Britain 
acknowledged the independence of the colonies, and 
recognized as a part of their southern boundary a line 
drawn due east from a point in the Mississippi River, 
in latitude 31° north, to the middle of the Appalachi- 
cola ; and at the same time she ceded to Spain by a 
separate agreement the two Floridas, but without defin- 
ing their northern boundaries. This omission gave rise 
to a dispute between Spain and the United States as to 
their respective limits. On the part of Spain it was 
contended that by the act of Great Britain, of 1764, the 
northern boundary of West Florida had been fixed at 
the line running due east from the mouth of the Yazoo 
to the Chattahoochee, and that all south of that line had 
been ceded to her ; whilst on the other hand, the United 
States as strenuously maintained that the act fixing and 
enlarging the limits of West Florida was superseded by 
the recent treaty, which extended their southern bound- 
ary to the 31st degree of north latitude, a hundred and 
ten miles further south than the line claimed by 
Spain. 

Spain, however, had possession of the disputed terri- 
tory by right of conquest, and evidently had no intention 
of giving it up. She strengthened her garrisons at 
Baton Rouge and Natchez, and built a fort at Vicksburg, 
and subsequently one at New Madrid, on the Missouri 
side of the Mississippi, just below the mouth of the Ohio ; 
and of the latter she made a port of entry where vessels 
from the Ohio were obliged to land and declare their 
cargoes. She even denied the right of the United States 
to the region between the Mississippi and the Alleghany 
Mountains, which had been ceded to them by Great Brit- 



THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE. 71 

ain on the ground that the conquests made by Governor 
Galvez, of West Florida, and by Don Eugenio Pierre, 1 

The following is the account of this expedition : — 

From the Madrid Gazette of the 12th March, 1786. 

Translation. — By a letter from the commandant general of the 
army of operations at the Havana and governour of Louisiana, his 
majesty has advices, that a detachment of sixty-five militia men, 
and sixty Indians of the nations Otaguos, Sotu, and Putuatami, 
under the command of Don Eugenio Pierre, a captain of militia, ac- 
companied by Don Carlos Tayon, a sub-lieutenant of militia, by 
Don Luis Chevalier, a man well versed in the language of the In- 
dians, and by their great chiefs Eleturno and Naquigen, which 
marched the 2d January, 1781, from the town of St. Luis of the 
Illinois, had possessed themselves of the post of St. Joseph, which 
the English occupied at two hundred and twenty leagues distance 
from that of the above-mentioned St. Luis ; having suffered in so 
extensive a march, and so rigorous a season, the greatest incon- 
veniences from cold and hunger, exposed to continued risks from 
the country being possessed by savage nations, and having to pass 
over parts covered with snow, and each one being obliged to carry 
provision for his own subsistence, and various merchandises which 
were necessary to content, in case of need, the barbarous nations 
through whom they were obliged to cross. The commander, by 
seasonable negotiations and precautions, prevented a considerable 
body of Indians, who were at the devotion of the English, from 
opposing this expedition ; for it would otherwise have been diffi- 
cult to have accomplished the taking of the said post. They 
made prisoners of the few English they found in it, the others 
having perhaps retired in consequence of some prior notice. Don 
Eugenio Pierre took possession, in the name of the king, of that 
place and its dependencies, and of the river of the Illinois ; in 
consequence whereof the standard of his majesty was there dis- 
played during the whole time. He took the English one, and de- 
livered it on his arrival at St. Luis to Don Francisco Cruzat, the 
commandant of that post. 

The destruction of the magazine of provisions and goods which 
the English had there (the greater part of it which was divided 
among our Indians and those who lived at St. Joseph as had been 



72 MISSOURI. 

of Fort St. Joseph, "near the sources of the Illinois," 
had vested the title to all this country in her ; and she 
insisted that what she did not own was possessed by the 
Indians, and could not therefore belong to the United 
States. Even as late as 1795, she claimed to have 
bought from the Chickasaws the bluffs which bear their 
name, and which are situated on the east bank of the 
Mississippi some distance north of the most northerly 
boundary ever assigned by Great Britain to West 
Florida. 

Here, then, was cause for " a very pretty quarrel," and 
to add to the ill feeling which grew out of it, Spain de- 
nied the right of the people of the United States to the 
"free navigation of the Mississippi," — a right which 
had been conceded to them by Great Britain with all the 
formalities with which she had received it from France. 
Whether it was competent for her, thus, to hand over to 
a third party the right which she undoubtedly had of 
passing, at will, through this portion of the dominions of 
Spain is a point about which opinions may differ. One 
thing, however, is certain, that no self-respecting people, 
powerful enough to prevent the exercise of such a right, 

offered them in case they did not oppose our troops) was not the 
only advantage resulting from the success of this expedition, for 
thereby it became impossible for the English to execute their plan 
of attacking the fort of St. Luis of the Illinois, and it also served 
to intimidate these savage nations, and oblige them to promise to 
remain neuter, which they do at present. 

When you consider the ostensible object of this expedition, the 
distance of it, the formalities with which the place, the country, 
and the river were taken possession of in the name of his Catho- 
lick majesty, I am persuaded it will not be necessary for me to 
swell this letter with remarks that would occur to a reader of far 
less penetration than yourself. — Secret Journal, vol. iv. (U. S. 
Doc. 205.) 



THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE. 73 

would ever suffer it to pass unchallenged. To this ex- 
tent, then, it must be conceded that Spain occupied solid 
ground, and in the present instance her position was 
strengthened by the fact that, strictly speaking, the free 
navigation of the Mississippi was not the point in dis- 
pute. Of itself, this phrase meant nothing tangible, for 
a sea-going vessel, as then constructed, could not reach 
the Ohio ; neither could a flatboat, such as the people 
of Kentucky generally used for sending their surplus 
produce down the river, navigate the ocean. What was 
needed to make the right of any value to the people of 
the Ohio valley was the additional right to take their 
produce into a Spanish port, New Orleans, and either 
sell it then and there, or else store it, subject to certain 
conditions, until such time as it suited them to transfer 
it to sea-going vessels. This right Spain would not con- 
cede ; and as the people of the Ohio valley were deter- 
mined to have it, cost what it might, it brought on a 
series of intrigues between the Spanish governors of 
Louisiana and certain influential citizens west of the 
Alleghanies which threatened the stability of the Amer- 
ican Union almost before it was formed, and ultimately 
led to the purchase of Louisiana, and to the sectional 
struggle for political power which, aligning itself on dif- 
ferent issues, finally culminated in the election of Lin- 
coln and the war of secession. 1 

At length in 1795, after ten years of procrastination, 
the prospect of a European war, in which Spain and 
England were to be ranged on different sides, and the 

1 "We agreed and lamented the one inevitable consequence of 
the annexation of Louisiana to the Union would be to diminish 
the relative weight and influence of the Northern section. ' ' John 
Quincy Adams in New England Federalism, p. 148. Boston, 1877. 



74 MISSOURI. 

necessity which this imposed on the former power of 
guarding her American possessions by the interposition 
of a neutral and friendly state between upper Louisiana 
and Canada, brought about an agreement between Spain 
and the United States which resulted in the treaty of 
Madrid. By the terms of this treaty, Spain recognized 
the 31st degree of north latitude as the boundary be- 
tween the United States and West Florida ; and she 
agreed to permit the people of the United States to use 
the port of New Orleans as a place of deposit for their 
merchandise and effects, and to export the same free 
of all duty or charge except a reasonable consideration 
to be paid for storage and other incidental expenses. 
This agreement was to be in force for three years, at 
the end of which time, his Catholic majesty " promised 
either to continue this permission, if he found during 
that time that it was not prejudicial to the interests of 
Spain, or if he should not agree to continue it there, 
he agreed to assign, on another part of the banks of the 
Mississippi, an equivalent establishment." At the ex- 
piration of the three years, the agreement was contin- 
ued by tacit consent, and it remained in force until 
October, 1802, when the intendant, Morales, in oppo- 
sition to the advice of the governor, canceled it, and re- 
fused to name any other place of deposit, as the Ameri- 
cans contended he was bound to do under the treaty. 
This ill-judged act worked an injury to both parties. It 
caused a scarcity of provisions at New Orleans, and it 
effectually shut out the people of the Western States 
from a market for their surplus produce, thus provoking 
throughout all that region a storm of indignation not 
only against Spain, but also against France ; for by this 
time the fact of the retrocession was known, and it was 



THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE. 75 

generally believed that the right of deposit would not 
have been revoked except at her request. 

At this time the population of the Ohio valley- 
amounted to about six hundred thousand souls, and they 
were in no mood to submit to a proceeding which they 
regarded as being inimical to their interests, as indeed it 
was, and also as a violation of treaty obligations, which 
was a matter of some doubt, " the law of nature " to 
the contrary notwithstanding. " The Mississippi," they 
said, " is ours by the law of nature. ... Its mouth is 
the only issue ... to our waters, and we wish to use it 
for our vessels. No power in the world shall deprive 
us of this right. ... If our liberty in this matter is 
disputed, nothing shall prevent our taking possession of 
the capital, and when we are once masters of it, we 
shall know how to maintain ourselves there. If Con- 
gress refuses us effectual protection, if it forsakes us, 
we will adopt the measures which our safety requires, 
even if they endanger the peace of the Union and our 
connection with the other States. No protection, no 
allegiance." 

In November, Mr. Madison wrote to the American 
minister at Madrid to the effect that the proclamation 
of Morales, prohibiting the right of deposit at New Or- 
leans, was a direct and palpable violation of the treaty 
of 1795, and expressed the hope that the Spanish gov- 
ernment would neither lose a moment in countermand- 
ing it, nor hesitate to repair every damage which might 
result from it. You are aware, he said, of the sensibil- 
ity of our Western citizens to such an occurrence ; and 
this sensibility, he added, is justified by the interests 
they have at stake. " The Mississippi to them is every- 
thing. It is the Hudson, the Delaware, the Potomac, 



76 MISSOURI. 

and all the navigable rivers of the Atlantic States, 
formed into one stream. . . . It is to be hoped that the 
intendant will be led to see the error which he has 
committed, and to correct it before a very great share 
of its mischief will have happened. Should he prove 
as obstinate as he has been ignorant or wicked, nothing 
can temper the irritation and indignation of the West- 
ern country but a persuasion that the energy of their 
government will obtain from that of Spain the most am- 
ple redress." Mr. Livingston held much the same lan- 
guage in Paris, and made good use of the hostile out- 
burst by way of enforcing the proposition which he had 
previously submitted to the French cabinet for the pur- 
chase of New Orleans and the Floridas. Congress, too, 
took up the matter, and in February, 1803, after a 
lengthy debate, resolutions of a decidedly belligerent 
character were adopted. 

Before the news of this action could reach Europe, 
the Spanish king " had disapproved of the order of Mo- 
rales, prohibiting the introduction of goods, wares, and 
merchandise from thfe United States into the port of 
New Orleans, and had ordered that the United States 
should continue to enjoy the right of deposit there, but 
without prejudice to his right of substituting some 
other spot on the banks of the Mississippi," as provided 
in the treaty of Madrid. Unquestionably this was a 
politic move, and a few years earlier it would have 
been hailed as a harbinger of peace by the people of 
the Ohio valley ; but of late, events had moved rapidly 
both in Europe and America, and the time had gone by 
when the destiny of Louisiana could be affected by any- 
thing that Spain might or might not do. The fact of 
the retrocession, hitherto jealously guarded, was now 



THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE. 77 

openly proclaimed, and England, armed for the struggle 
with France which had now become inevitable, stood 
ready to seize the mouth of the Mississippi on the fir- 
ing of the first gun. This was well known to the First 
Consul, and, no doubt, it decided him ; for whilst as a 
matter of fact he could afford to ignore the protest of 
as weak a power as the United States then was, and 
probably would have done so, yet with the sword and 
purse of England in the scale against him, the conditions 
were changed, and he saw, at once, that the coveted 
prize had gone from him forever. Resolved, however, 
that what was France's loss should not be England's 
gain, and being in sore need of money, he determined to 
sell not only New Orleans, but the entire colony, and 
Talleyrand was instructed to sound the American min- 
ister on the subject. Accordingly on the 11th of April, 
1803, he astonished Mr. Livingston, whose modest de- 
sires had scarcely reached beyond New Orleans, by 
asking him how much he would give for the whole of 
Louisiana ? Not being prepared to name a definite 
sum or even to negotiate for the entire colony, he an- 
swered twenty millions, " provided our citizens were 
paid for the losses inflicted on their commerce by French 
privateers." This was pronounced too little, and Mr. 
Livingston then proposed to defer the further con- 
sideration of the matter until after the arrival of Mr. 
Monroe, who was daily expected in Paris, and who was 
specially charged by President Jefferson to assist in this 
negotiation. Fortunately Mr. Monroe arrived at this 
time, and he and Mr. Livingston at once took up the 
negotiation. After a little finessing as to the price be- 
tween them and M. Barbe-Marbois, the French repre- 
sentative, the terms were agreed on, and the treaty was 
concluded on the 30th of April, 1803. 



78 MISSOURI. 

By it the United States obtained " Louisiana, with all 
its rights and appurtenances as fully and in the same 
manner as they had been acquired by the French Re- 
public from Spain, on condition that the Americans 
should pay to France eighty millions of francs, twenty 
millions of which were to be used in payment of what 
was due by France to the citizens of the United States." 
Certain commercial advantages were also conceded to 
France ; and in Article III., written by Bonaparte him- 
self, it was stipulated that " the inhabitants of the ceded 
territory shall be incorporated in the Union of the United 
States, and admitted as soon as possible, according to 
the principles of the Federal Constitution, to the enjoy- 
ment of all the rights, advantages, and immunities of 
citizens of the United States ; and in the mean time they 
shall be maintained and protected in the free enjoy- 
ment of their liberty, property, and the religion which 
they profess." 

As soon as the terms of this treaty became known, 
Spain protested against it, on the ground that France 
had no right to make the sale, because, first, she had 
agreed never to alienate the colony ; and, secondly, be- 
cause her own title was not yet complete, owing to the 
failure on her part to secure the recognition of the king 
of Etruria by the cabinets of London and St. Peters- 
burg. In reply, Mr. Madison contended that the prom- 
ise " never to alienate " formed no part of the original 
treaty between France and Spain, and that if it had 
done so it would not affect the purchase by the United 
States, which had been made in good faith, and in igno- 
rance of any such understanding. He also called atten- 
tion to the fact that, under date of May 4th, Spain had, 
herself, referred the United States to France as being 



THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE. 79 

the only power that could convey this territory, and he 
added somewhat sarcastically that if any further evi- 
dence were needed as to the validity of the French title, 
it might be found in the orders of the king of Spain, 
transferring that colony to France. 

To this statement on the part of the United States, 
there could be no satisfactory reply ; and on the 10th of 
February, 1804, the Spanish minister, in a letter to Mr. 
Pinckney, denied that he had given any order to oppose 
the transfer of Louisiana, and declared that " his maj- 
esty thought proper to renounce his protest against the 
alienation of Louisiana by France." What the French 
government thought of the objections brought forward 
by the Spanish court may be inferred from the letter of 
the French charge at Washington, dated October 14, 
1803, in which he announced that as soon as the rati- 
fications were exchanged, " he would proceed without 
delay ... to the delivery of the colony to the persons 
whom the President of the United States shall appoint 
to take possession of it." In spite, however, of the har- 
mony which prevailed between the two powers that 
were most directly concerned, the protest of Spain was 
taken advantage of by the opponents of Mr. Jefferson's 
administration, and made one of the grounds upon 
which they urged the rejection of the treaty. It proved 
of no avail, for, as John Quincy Adams subsequently 
truly said, " Notwithstanding the objections and appre- 
hensions of many individuals, of many wise, able, and 
excellent men in various parts of the Union, yet such 
is the public favor attending the transaction which com- 
menced by the negotiation of this treaty, and which, I 
hope, will terminate in our full, undisturbed, and undis- 
puted possession of the ceded territory, that I firmly 



80 MISSOURI. 

believe if an amendment to the Constitution, amply suf- 
ficient for the accomplishment of everything for which 
we have contracted, shall be proposed, as I think it 
ought, it will be adopted by the legislature of every 
State in the Union." This course, however, was not 
thought necessary by the friends of the measure. The 
constitutional objections to which Mr. Adams referred, 
and which were shared, to some extent, by both Jeffer- 
son and Madison, were brushed aside with character- 
istic disregard ; and on the 26th of October, 1803, a 
few days after the ratification of the treaty, an act to 
enable the President to take possession of the ceded 
territory was passed in the Senate by a vote of 26 to 6 ; 
and on the 28th it was carried in the House by a vote 
of 89 to 23. On the 29th of the same month, the House 
passed a bill authorizing the creation of a stock to the 
amount of eleven million two hundred and fifty thou- 
sand dollars, for the purpose of carrying this treaty 
into effect, and when, on the 3d of November, 1803, it 
came before the Senate, Mr. Adams, rising superior to 
sectional considerations, was found side by side with 
Breckenridge, of Kentucky, among its stoutest sup- 
porters. 

With the adoption of this measure, congressional 
action upon the subject was at an end, and it now only 
remained for the United States to take possession of the 
territory which they had purchased. This was done 
without difficulty. On the 30th of November the Span- 
ish authorities at New Orleans handed over the colony to 
Laussat, the French representative, and on the 20th of 
December following, he formally transferred it to Gen- 
eral Wilkinson and Governor Claiborne, of Mississippi, 
who were authorized to receive it on the part of the 



THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE. 81 

United States. When the French flag that was floating 
in the square was hauled down and the American flag 
was run up, " a group of American citizens, who stood 
at the corner of the square, waved their hats in token 
of respect for their country's flag, and a few of them 
greeted it with their voices." No emotion, it is said, 
was manifested by any other portion of the assemblage, 
unless the tears which, according to another account, 
were shed on the occasion should be taken as an index 
of the feelings of those who witnessed the ceremony. 

With but little change, save in the actors, this scene 
was repeated on the 9th of March, 1804, in the then 
village of St. Louis. On that day, the American troops 
crossed the river from Cahokia, and Don Carlos Dehault 
Delassus delivered upper Louisiana to Captain Amos 
Stoddard, of the United States Army, who was com- 
missioned to receive it on behalf of France. The next 
day he transferred it to the United States, and thus put 
an end to the rule of Spain in the valley of the Mis- 
sissippi, which, counting from the landing of Ulloa at 
New Orleans, had lasted thirty-eight years. 



CHAPTER V. 

LOUISIANA territory: 1804 TO 1812. 

On the 26th of March, 1804, only about two weeks 
after Captain, or, to give him the title by which he is 
better known, Major Stoddard took command at St. 
Louis, and in evident anticipation of that event, Presi- 
dent Jefferson approved of the act of Congress by 
which Louisiana was divided into two parts, and all 
north of the 33d parallel of north latitude was formed 
into a district, and styled the District of Louisiana. 
For judicial and administrative purposes this district, 
or upper Louisiana as we shall continue to call it, was 
attached to the territory of Indiana, and in October of 
that year the governor and judges of that territory pre- 
pared a series of ordinances, and inaugurated the new 
government within the district, thereby relieving Major 
Stoddard from the anomalous position which he had 
hitherto held of first civil commandant of upper Louis- 
iana, under the appointment of Governor Claiborne, of 
Mississippi, with all the powers and prerogatives of a 
Spanish lieutenant-governor. 

To that portion of the act which attached the district 
to Indiana, as well as to those clauses which declared 
all grants of lands made subsequent to the treaty of 
St. Ildefonso to be void and of no effect, and which 
related to the prospective removal of the Indians from 
the east side of the Mississippi to the west, the people 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 83 

of upper Louisiana were violently opposed ; and in a 
remonstrance signed on the 29th of September, 1804, 
by " Representatives elected by the Freemen of their 
respective districts in the District of Louisiana," they 
prayed for the repeal of the act, and petitioned for the 
erection of the district into a territory of the second 
grade, the rank to which their numbers entitled them. 
They also claimed the right, under the treaty, of im- 
porting slaves into the district, which was prohibited in 
the territory of Orleans, as lower Louisiana was now 
called, but which had not been denied to them ; and 
they asked that " funds should be appropriated for the 
support, and lands set apart or bought for the building 
and maintaining of a French and English school in each 
county, and for the building of a seminary of learning, 
where not only the French and English languages, but 
likewise the dead languages, mathematics, mechanics, 
natural and moral philosophy, and the principles of the 
Constitution of the United States should be tauo-ht." 

Of the fifteen signers of this " Remonstrance and 
Petition," as it was termed, eight were unquestionably of 
French extraction — a proof, if any were needed, of the 
ease with which they adopted the methods of their neigh- 
bors from the other side of the river. On the 4th of 
January, 1805, this petition was presented in the lower 
house of Congress, and was referred to a committee 
which reported, on the 25th of the same month, a reso- 
lution declaring that " provision ought to be made, by 
law, for extending to the inhabitants of Louisiana the 
right of self-government," though with singular incon- 
sistency they accompanied the resolution by a number 
of so-called " wise and salutary restrictions "as to the 
subjects upon which freedom of action was to be allowed. 



84 MISSOURI. 

This report was adopted, and a committee, of which 
John Randolph was chairman, was appointed to draw 
up an act in accordance with its provisions ; but before 
they could report, a bill was received from the Senate 
which erected the district into a territory of the first or 
lowest grade, and changed its title from the District to 
the Territory of Louisiana. This bill was at once passed, 
and on the 3d of March, 1805, it received the signature 
of President Jefferson and became a law, though it was 
not to go into effect until the 4th of the July following. 
By it, the President was empowered to appoint a gov- 
ernor and three judges, who were to act together in a 
legislative capacity, and who were authorized to adopt 
such regulations as they might deem proper for the 
government of the territory, subject of course to the ap- 
proval of Congress. No mention is made in the act of 
the land grants of the French and Spanish commandants, 
nor is there any reference to the removal of the Indians 
to the west side of the Mississippi, the two measures in 
which the people of the territory were most interested. % 
So far as the Indians were concerned, it was not per- 
haps necessary that there should have been any action, 
at this time, as the intentions of the general govern- 
ment in this respect had been made sufficiently mani- 
fest, during the preceding autumn, by a treaty in which 
the Sacs and Foxes had relinquished some three mill- 
ion acres of land situated immediately north of the Mis- 
souri and in the angle formed by the junction of that 
stream with the Mississippi. In regard to the land 
grants, however, there were no such assurances ; and it 
was not until April, 1814, that an act was passed con- 
firming all claims made " by virtue of incomplete French 
or Spanish grants or concessions, or any warrant, or 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 85 

order of survey which was granted prior to the 10th of 
March, 1804," the day on which the United States took 
formal possession of upper Louisiana. 

Exactly why this just and politic measure was so long 
delayed is a question which it is useless now to discuss. 
Possibly, it may have been due to an unwillingness on 
the part of the United States to admit the right of Spain 
to dispose of any portion of the soil of Louisiana during 
the time that she continued to hold it, after the cession 
to France and before the final transfer to themselves, 
that is, from October 1, 1800, to March 10, 1804 ; or it 
may have been the result of certain well-grounded suspi- 
cions as to the fraudulent character of some of the giants 
made by the last two Spanish lieutenant-governors of 
upper Louisiana. In either event, it was a mistake, 
for as matters turned out it would have been productive 
of less harm if the government had, in the first place, 
submitted to the small loss with which it was threatened, 
instead of trying to save a few thousand acres of land 
by delaying the confirmation of these grants and there- 
by prolonging the jDeriod of " alarm and apprehension " 
which, we are told, prevailed very generally throughout 
the district in regard to these claims. 

That this delay, or rather the uncertainty of which 
it was, in some measure, the cause, may have led a 
number of the holders of these concessions, and of the 
entries made under them, to dispose of their claims at 
prices that were merely nominal is very probable ; but 
that it induced " many families to abandon the country," 
as was asserted on the floor of Congress, is believed to 
be a bit of exaggeration, excusable, perhaps, in view of 
the end sought to be obtained, but hardly to be taken 
as the literal statement of a truth. Indeed, the evidence 



86 MISSOURI. 

all seems to point the other way ; for upon examination 
it will be found that in a majority of the thirteen hun- 
dred and forty-two confirmations made prior to January, 
1813, the claims were still in the hands of the original 
holders of the concessions or of their immediate repre- 
sentatives ; and the fact that in 1810 the population 
amounted to over twenty thousand, about double the 
number it was estimated to have been when Major Stod- 
dard took possession of the district, indicates beyond all 
cavil that the number of families that had come into the 
territory during this interval was largely in excess of 
those that had quitted it. 

In spite, however, of the silence of this act in re- 
gard to these titles, and although it stopped short of 
what the people of the district thought they had a right 
to expect in the way of territorial advancement, it was a 
step in the right direction. It did not, it is true, allow 
the citizens of the newly formed territory to choose 
their own officers, frame their own laws, or do much 
else that a self-governing community is usually supposed 
to do ; but it gave them officers whose field of duty was 
limited to the territory ; and, theoretically, it made of 
that territory a sort of preparatory school, in which 
the inhabitants were to take their first lessons in the 
science of self-government, though, practically, except 
in the introduction of the trial by jury, it made but few 
changes either in the laws or in the manner in which 
they were administered. 

Under the circumstances this was no doubt the best 
thing that could have been done. The experiences of a 
large minority of the citizens of the territory, accustomed 
as they had been to the summary methods of the Spanish 
commandants, was hardly of a character to fit them for 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 87 

some of the duties that were now to devolve upon them, 
and though they adapted themselves to the new order of 
things with marvelous ease and rapidity, yet our fathers, 
wiser, perhaps, in their generation than we have been in 
ours, appear to have been of the opinion that a certain 
amount of training was not a bad preparation for the re- 
sponsibilities of citizenship. Accordingly they assigned 
Louisiana to a position in the first or lowest grade of 
territories, and not in the second, as was expected and 
desired. 

Under this new regime the first governor was General 
James Wilkinson, and with him were associated, the one 
as chief justice and the other as secretary, J. B. C. 
Lucas, a Frenchman by birth and a former member of 
Congress from Pennsylvania, and Dr. Joseph Browne, 
of New York, who is said to have been appointed upon 
" the special and single recommendation of Aaron Burr," 
whose brother-in-law he was. 

Wilkinson at this time stood high in the favor of the 
authorities at Washington, and though the suspicious 
character of the dealings which he had formerly carried 
on with the Spanish officials in lower Louisiana must 
have been well known, yet he seems to have retained the 
confidence of Mr. Jefferson and his cabinet to the very 
end. He was, if we may credit Postmaster General 
Granger, " one of the most agreeable, best informed, most 
genteel, moderate, and sensible Republicans in the na- 
tion ; " and if to this be added his high military rank 
and his familiarity with border life and Indian affairs, it 
would seem as if he must have been almost an ideal man 
for the place. And yet, notwithstanding these qualifi- 
cations, real and supposed, his career as governor was a 
failure ; not that he did anything in his official capacity 



88 MISSOURI. 

that was positively harmful to the people of the territory, 
or left undone anything, within his power, that might 
have contributed to their welfare, but for the reason that, 
during the year or more that he was in authority, that 
is, from July, 1805, to August, 1806, he succeeded in so 
embroiling himself with the territorial officials with whom 
it was his duty to act, as to interfere very seriously with 
his chances of usefulness. In less than four months after 
his arrival in the territory, his relations with Rufus 
Easton, one of the most honorable men in all that region, 
and the first postmaster St. Louis ever had, were of such 
a character that he refused to send his mail through that 
office ; and before the end of the year, according to his 
own statement, Judge Lucas, Colonel Hammond, who had 
been commandant of the district of St. Louis under Gov- 
ernor Harrison, of Indiana, and other leading citizens of 
the territory were engaged in " a cabal " to bring about 
his removal. 

Of the causes that led to this opposition it is impos- 
sible to speak with certainty. The little that we know 
about the matter has to be picked out, item by item, 
from his own letters and from the evidence of his friends 
and enemies, submitted in a case in which his conduct 
as governor was not a point at issue, and hence the diffi- 
culty of reducing the charges against him to anything 
like a definite form, and the many grains of allowance 
with which they are to be taken. Without attempting, 
therefore, anything like a detailed statement of the causes 
of complaint against him, it will be sufficient to say that 
in one of his letters we find a reference to the charge 
" of improper interference in the conduct of the com- 
missioners ; " and that Major Bruff, who seems to have 
been a personal as well as political enemy, asserts that 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 89 

he was in favor of keeping the territory under military- 
rule, and complains that he was not only " averse to the 
first American settlers and Democrats," of both of which 
classes he is said to have entertained an unfavorable 
opinion, but that he was " prepossessed in favor ... of 
the rich French landholders under antedated and other 
large grants, royalists, federalists, and Burrites, alias the 
new honest Republicans, who came out with him expect- 
ing appointments." Reduced to plain English, this 
simply means either that he had been engaged in land 
speculations on his private account, or had interfered 
with those of some of his neighbors ; and that in the 
distribution of the few offices that were within his gift, 
he had not met the expectations of one wing, at least, of 
the political party to which he owed his appointment. 

In regard to the first of these charges there is not 
much to be said. Wilkinson was a speculator, and no 
matter how high the position he happened to hold, there 
was never a time when he was not ready to engage in 
schemes for improving his pecuniary condition. This 
course was not necessarily criminal, neither was it always 
improper, though there were times when it was undigni- 
fied, and when it led him into the performance of acts 
that were open to suspicion. Such, indeed, seems to 
have been the case in the present instance ; for although 
in purchasing a large tract of land adjoining the spot he 
had selected as a cantonment for the troops, he laid him- 
self open to the accusation of using his official position 
for the purpose of advancing his private interest, yet he 
afterwards sold it to the government for the same price 
he had paid for it, and this fact is sufficient to induce 
those who are charitably disposed to acquit him of the 
charge. 



90 MISSOURI. 

But whilst cheerfully absolving him from blame in 
this particular transaction, it is not so easy to relieve him 
of the political offenses that are laid at his door. Upon 
this count of the indictment he is clearly guilty, though 
it may perhaps lighten our verdict to know that, in pur- 
suing the independent course which he seems to have 
marked out for himself, and which received the approval 
of the authorities at Washington, he claimed to have 
been actuated by a desire to unite the honest and mod- 
erate men of both parties, Federal as well as Republi- 
can, in an effort " to save the Constitution and prevent 
a division of property which the Democrats," led by 
that arch aristocrat Randolph, of Roanoke, are said to 
have u aimed at." Absurd as this explanation now seems, 
it was the reason, according to Major Bruff, that Wilkin- 
son assigned for the course which he had thought proper 
to pursue in administering the affairs of the territory ; 
and we therefore give it, not that his conduct stood 
in need of any justification even in that era of intense 
political feeling, but for the reason that it furnishes us 
with what may be considered either as a statement of 
the dangers that were then thought to threaten the exist- 
ence of the infant republic, or as a specimen of the clap- 
trap in which our fathers, under the pressure of party 
necessity, were wont to indulge. Be this as it may, 
there can be no question as to the extent of the oppo- 
sition which Wilkinson managed to excite, and of the 
high character of some of those who took side against 
him ; neither, on the other hand, can there be any doubt 
as to the honesty and integrity of those who defended 
him, among the stanchest of whom we must continue 
to reckon President Jefferson. 

Aside from the character of this opposition, which is of 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 91 

interest as showing the rapid growth of what are some- 
times termed American political ideas, but which is too 
often but another name for the vulgar greed for money 
or office, the only event of importance that occurred dur- 
ing Wilkinson's term was the short visit which, in Sep- 
tember, 1805, Aaron Burr made to his brother-in-law 
Dr. Browne, of St. Louis. Of the secret purposes of this 
visit, or rather of what are supposed to have been such, 
it is not my province to speak ; neither does it come 
within the limits marked out for my guidance to investi- 
gate the connection which may or may not have existed 
between Burr and Wilkinson. All that we are per- 
mitted to know on the subject is that both of these 
gentlemen were afterwards placed upon trial, the former 
in 1807 for conspiring to break up the federal Union, 
and the latter, several years later, for being an acces- 
sory to this and other crimes ; and that the government 
not only failed to prove that Burr was engaged in any 
such conspiracy, but that Wilkinson, who was the chief 
witness against him, was able to show that, in October, 
1804, he had written to Robert Smith, Mr. Jefferson's 
Secretary of the Navy, that " Burr was about some- 
thing," whether internal or external he could not say, 
but that " an eye ought to be kept on him." This let- 
ter, it will be observed, was written and received a year 
and more before the final collapse of Burr's plans, 
whatever they may have been ; and of course in the 
face of such evidence and of Wilkinson's subsequent 
conduct, it was impossible to convict him of any com- 
plicity with them. Accordingly, after one of the most 
searching investigations of which we have any record, 
he was, in December, 1811, acquitted by the court of 
inquiry which had been summoned to investigate the 
charges made against him. 



92 MISSOURI. 

Of the substantial justice of this verdict there is, to- 
day, but little doubt, though Burr, in after years, whilst 
ridiculing the idea that he had been engaged in any 
conspiracy against the federal Union, did not hesitate to 
say that his object had been to revolutionize Mexico, 
and that Wilkinson had been a party to the scheme, 
but that at the critical moment he had betrayed and de- 
feated it. That he did expose and defeat the move- 
ment is most true ; but whether he was ever a party to it 
is a point about which opinions may well differ. Burr's 
unsupported assertion is not sufficient to establish the 
fact ; and whilst there are circumstances in Wilkinson's 
career at this time which, taken by themselves, are cal- 
culated to make us doubt his integrity, yet inasmuch as 
they can, when considered with reference to the hostile 
attitude which the United States and Spain then held 
towards each other, be explained without in any way 
impeaching his honor, it is but fair to allow him the 
benefit of the doubt, and of the acquittal which neces- 
sarily goes with it. 

In September of the year following this visit, a few 
weeks only after Wilkinson had left for the scene of 
the boundary dispute between Spain and the United 
States on the banks of the Sabine, Lewis and Clark 
returned from their overland journey to the Pacific, 
bringing with them as one of the results of the expedi- 
tion a better knowledge of the extent and course of the 
Missouri and the Columbia rivers, and of the valleys 
through which they flow. It was the first expedition of 
the kind ever undertaken by our government, and the 
return of the party, safe and successful, after an absence 
of over two years, was hailed with delight throughout 
the entire West. Congress, too, sharing in the general 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 93 

acclaim, voted a grant of land to each person engaged 
in the expedition ; and in the spring of 1807, in further 
recognition of his services, Captain Lewis was appointed 
governor of the territory which he had done so much 
to make known. 

When, after a delay of some months, he arrived in 
St. Louis, he found the affairs of his government in a 
very disorderly condition. The officials are said to 
have been distracted by " feuds and contentions," and 
the people themselves, who seem to have caught the in- 
fection, " were divided into factions and parties." Un- 
satisfactory as is this picture, for which we are indebted 
to Mr. Jefferson, it is not as discouraging as is the one 
which Major Bruff has left us of the condition of affairs 
that then prevailed. According to him " the territory 
was convulsed ; society and confidence destroyed ; Amer- 
ican citizens obliged to arm with dirks and pistols, and 
the old inhabitants lamenting the change of masters." 
To a certain extent this account is true, but taken as a 
whole, the impression it conveys is decidedly erroneous. 
Thus, for instance, whilst it is true that the " old inhab- 
itants," meaning thereby the Creoles, were opposed to 
the transfer of the colony to the United States, as were 
a large number of the English-American residents as 
well, and whilst it is also true that there was more or 
less uneasiness throughout the territory, growing out of 
the delay of Congress in confirming certain classes of 
land grants, yet it is not true that society and confidence 
were destroyed ; neither were the American citizens 
obliged to arm themselves, though the custom of carry- 
ing weapons was at that time, and for some years after- 
wards, so general that " the judges on the benches had 
their pistols and ataghans by their sides." Indeed, so 



94 MISSOURI. 

far is the picture from being true to life that courts 
were held regularly in the different districts into which 
the territory had been divided, and, what is more to the 
purpose, they appear to have found no difficulty in en- 
forcing their decrees, even in cases where the supreme 
penalty of the law was adjudged. Real estate, too, had 
increased enormously in value, in some quarters as much 
as five hundred per cent. ; and the eager demand for it 
that prevailed everywhere, a demand which seems to 
have been shared by the witness himself, was scarcely 
compatible with the state of lawlessness that is said to 
have existed. 

Whilst, therefore, so much of this testimony as refers 
to the overthrow of social order may be rejected safely, it 
cannot be denied that there were causes at work which, 
among a people so combative naturally as the American 
emigrants were, occasionally brought on one of those 
bloody personal encounters which gave the territory the 
reputation of being an uncomfortable abiding place for 
persons of weak nerves. Among these causes may be 
mentioned the prominence of the military element at 
certain social centres, and the tone which it gave to 
society ; the personal character which the heated polit- 
ical discussions of that day were wont to assume ; and 
the lawsuits and disputes which sprang from conflicting 
land claims, mining rights, and other similar sources, 
and which were not unfrequently submitted to the arbi- 
trament of the pistol. " ' Mr. P.,' said the well-known 
Colonel S. to a neighbor with whom he had a dispute 
about a mining claim, ' we have been friends for a long 
time, and I feel great regret that any misunderstanding 
should have arisen between u&; here we are entirely 
alone, and there is no one to interrupt us — let us settle 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 95 

the matter in an amicable way. You know my aver- 
sion to law and lawyers, and their quibbles ; I have 
here a couple of friends that have no mistake in them. 
Take your choice, they are both loaded and equally 
true.' Mr. P., without losing his presence of mind, 
thanked him and declined the proffered civility on ac- 
count of important business which could not be trans- 
acted by a ghost, whereupon Colonel S. resumed the 
conversation, which he had interrupted for the purpose 
of making what he considered a friendly offer." 

Fortunately, the circles within which these influences 
were active were necessarily small, being confined al- 
most entirely to the two extremes of the social scale. 
At the one end were to be found " the persons of note/' 
as Brackenridge calls them, or " the small class that 
denominate themselves the gentlemen," as they are 
styled by Flint, among whom the duel was still recog- 
nized as the proper mode of settling personal quarrels, 
as it still was in some of the more favored localities of 
the east. At the other were the miners, consisting of 
" some of the rudest and most savage of the uncivilized 
portion of civilized society," who were exceedingly jeal- 
ous of their " natural rights," as taking lead from pub- 
lic lands seems to have been termed, but who, even 
when engaged in this illegal pursuit, were so far from 
being lawless that they had found it necessary to frame 
a set of regulations which, with but little change, may 
have served as models for those that, long afterwards, 
brought order into the mining camps of California. 

Among these two classes, comprising at best but a 
small part of the total population of the territory, 
fatal duels and bloody " rencontres " were relatively 
frequent, though they were not so common as they are 



96 MISSOURI. 

sometimes represented to have been, nor were they so 
general. Upon this point Timothy Flint, a New 
England clergyman, who lived in upper Louisiana from 
1816 to about 1820, and who traveled extensively not 
only in that territory, but also in what are now the States 
of Arkansas and Louisiana, is certainly good authority. 
Protesting against the injustice of ascribing to a whole 
community the crimes of a few fierce and ungovernable 
natures he tells us that "it is true there are worthless 
people here, and the most so, it must be confessed, are 
from New England. It is true there are gamblers, and 
gougers, and outlaws ; but there are fewer of them than, 
from the nature of things and the character of the age 
and the world, we ought to expect. ... I have," he 
adds, " traveled in these regions thousands of miles un- 
der all circumstances of exposure and danger . . . and 
this, too, in many instances where I was not known as a 
minister, or where such knowledge would have had no 
influence in protecting me. I have never carried the 
slightest weapon of defense. I scarcely remember to 
have experienced anything that resembled insult, or to 
have felt myself in danger from the people. I have 
often seen men that had lost an eye. Instances of mur- 
der, numerous and horrible in their circumstances, have 
occurred in my vicinity. But they were such lawless 
rencontres as terminate in murder everywhere, and in 
which the drunkenness, brutality, and violence were mu- 
tual. They were catastrophes, in which quiet and sober 
men would be in no danger of being involved." 

Of the backwoodsman of the West, that representative 
in fact as well as in name of the great majority of the 
emigrants, the same writer says : " He is generally an 
amiable and virtuous man. . . . He has vices and bar- 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 97 

barisms peculiar to his situation. His manners are 
rough. He wears, it may be, a long beard. He has a 
great quantity of bear or deer skins wrought into his 
household establishment, his furniture and dress. He 
carries a knife, or a dirk in his bosom, and when in the 
woods has a rifle on his back and a pack of dogs at his 
heels. An Atlantic stranger, transferred directly from 
one of our cities to his door, would recoil from a ren- 
counter with him. But remember, that his rifle and his 
dogs are among his chief means of support and profit. 
Remember, that all his first days here were passed in 
dread of the savages. Remember, that he still encoun- 
ters them, still meets bears and panthers. Enter his 
door and tell him you are benighted, and wish the shel- 
ter of his cabin for the night. The welcome is indeed 
seemingly ungracious : ' I reckon you can stay,' or ' I 
suppose we must let you stay.' But this apparent ungra- 
ciousness is the harbinger of every kindness that he can 
bestow, and every comfort that his cabin can afford. 
Good coffee, corn bread and butter, venison, pork, wild 
and tame fowls, are set before you. His wife, timid, 
silent, reserved, but constantly attentive to your comfort, 
does not sit at the table with you, but like the wives 
of the patriarchs stands and attends on you. You are 
shown the best bed which the house can offer. When 
the kind hospitality has been afforded you as long as you 
choose to stay, and when you depart, and speak about 
your bill, you are most commonly told with some slight 
mark of resentment that they do not keep tavern. Even 
the flaxen-haired children will turn away from your 
money. ... If we were to try them by the standard of 
New England customs and opinions, that is to say, the 
customs of a people under entirely different circum- 



98 MISSOURI. 

stances, there would be many things in the picture that 
would strike us offensively. They care little about min- 
isters, and think less about paying them. They are 
averse to all, even the most necessary, restraints. They 
are destitute of the forms and observances of society and 
religion ; but they are sincere and kind without profes- 
sions, and have a coarse but substantial morality." In 
a word, they were " a hardy, adventurous, hospitable, 
rough, but sincere and upright race." 

These were the people who were now coming into the 
territory, and who were to shape its destiny. As a rule 
they were sturdy, self-reliant scions of British stock, emi- 
grants chiefly from the States that were afterwards known 
as Southern, though Pennsylvania had already sent a 
colony of hard-working Germans, and among those who 
came from New York and New England we recognize 
such honored names as Easton and Hempstead. Es- 
pecially liberal were Kentucky and Virginia in the con- 
tributions which they made to the life of the new terri- 
tory, just as in after-years Missouri sent her sons and 
daughters to people the regions still further to the west 
and south. 

Unlike the early French settlers, who preferred to live 
in villages and were content with an allotment in the 
common fields, these new-comers were farmers after the 
English- American fashion, and their objects in coming 
to the territory were to acquire land in as large tracts 
as possible, and to avail themselves of the vast extent of 
free pasturage or " range " which the unoccupied govern- 
ment land afforded. To secure these advantages, they 
passed by the villages and settled neighborhoods near 
the river, and penetrating into the wilderness they estab- 
lished themselves on detached farms, usually at some 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 99 

distance from each other ; for the average emigrant from 
the States " never wished to live near enough to hear 
the bark of his neighbor's dog," unless the prospect of 
danger from the Indians obliged him to build his cabin 
within easy reach of some central fort or station, to 
which, in case of necessity, he might repair. 

With the incoming tide of emigration and its steady 
flow westward, the frontier, which at the time of the 
purchase in 1803 may be said to have been limited to 
the villages and settlements along the west bank of the 
river, was gradually pushed forward, until at the close of 
the first decade of the century the inhabited portion of 
the territory comprised an area some fifteen or twenty 
miles in width, extending from the Arkansas to a point a 
short distance above the mouth of the Missouri, and em- 
bracing the districts of New Madrid, Cape Girardeau, 
Ste. Genevieve, St. Louis, and St. Charles. At this rate 
of progress, it was a question of only a few years before 
the advance guard of pioneers would be upon Indian 
territory, if it was not already there ; and as such con- 
tact had always led to hostilities, it became an object 
with the authorities at Washington, as it was their pol- 
icy, to lessen the chances of collision by buying the land 
next adjoining the settlements of the whites, and remov- 
ing the Indians further westward. In pursuance of this 
plan, Pierre Chouteau, acting under the instructions of 
Governor Lewis, concluded a treaty with the Osages in 
1808, by which it was agreed that the boundary between 
them and the whites should begin at Fort Clark, a post 
on the Missouri thirty-five miles below the mouth of the 
Kansas, and " extend due south to the Arkansas, and 
down the same to the Mississippi." All east of this line, 
comprising, as it was then estimated, about forty-eight 



100 MISSOURI. 

millions of acres, was ceded to the United States. By 
the same treaty, though this seems to have been rather 
a formality, all the lands north of the Missouri to which 
the Osages had any claims were also relinquished. Of 
the territory so ceded, something over one half is said 
to have been within the limits of Missouri, and this 
amount, somewhat exaggerated, it is true, added to the 
three millions of acres purchased in the autumn of 
1804 from the Sacs and Foxes, gives an estimated total 
of about twenty-seven millions of acres, — almost two 
thirds of the present area of the State, — to which the 
Indian title was extinguished. 

With the terms of this treaty, or the circumstances 
under which it was concluded, we are not now concerned, 
except in so far as the knowledge of the manner in which 
these purchases were sometimes made may cause us to 
look with less austerity upon the free-and-easy way in 
which the French and Spaniards were accustomed to 
deal with questions of this sort. According to their 
theory, the land belonged to them, and not to the Indi- 
ans, and hence they were never troubled by any consci- 
entious scruples as to the title by which they held it. 
When they wanted a tract, be it large or small, they did 
not think it necessary to go through the farce of a treaty 
in order to get it, but they simply took what they wanted 
and indemnified the Indians, or, if the exact terms be 
preferred, "kept them quiet" by a system of presents, a 
mode of procedure which the savages could understand, 
and which was " more acceptable to them than the same 
articles would have been if given in payment of a debt." 
Such a course, no doubt, savored of the strong hand, but 
it was open and above board ; and if, as was usually the 
case, the Indians were the sufferers in the transaction, 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 101 

so also were they in their dealings with the United States. 
Indeed, on the score of justice and morality, it may be 
questioned whether the high-handed measures of the 
French and Spaniards were not less objectionable than 
were the devious methods to which our government 
sometimes resorted when seeking to consummate a so- 
called purchase. Thus, for example, when Brackenridge, 
speaking of such transactions in general, but with evi- 
dent reference to this particular case, tells us that " our 
agents may have gone too far in procuring the consent 
of the chiefs," or that " the chiefs may have been created 
for the express purpose" of giving their consent, it is but 
another and a gentler way of saying that the sale may 
have been brought about by bribery, or in some other in- 
defensible way. Happily, the evidence is not sufficient 
to justify us in asserting that either of the methods re- 
ferred to was adopted in this instance ; but there were 
others, not less efficacious, which were equally available, 
and the fact that the great body of the Osages were dis- 
satisfied with the terms of the treaty is proof that there 
were some features about it that did not commend them- 
selves to the Indians' sense of fairness. This, however, 
was a matter of but little moment to the other contract- 
ing party. For reasons that were perfectly satisfactory, 
it was deemed necessary to insist upon the purchase, 
though the authorities at Washington suffered two years 
to elapse before they took any steps towards complying 
with their part of the bargain. At the end of this period, 
the Osages were informed that the first payment for their 
land was ready, and, accordingly, some thirty or forty 
of their chiefs and head men repaired to St. Louis, ap- 
parently not so much for the purpose of receiving the 
amount due them as to protest against the enforcement 



102 MISSOURI. 

of the treaty, which, they contended, had been unfairly 
made. In a council held for the purpose, Le Sonneur, 
who was the orator for the occasion, and who is said to 
have " spoken with great art and some eloquence," ad- 
dressed the governor as follows : " He was much sur- 
prised to hear of this purchase, which had been forgotten 
by his nation, and he supposed had also been forgotten 
by his great father. The sale was made by those who 
had no authority ; and his great father not having com- 
plied with his part of the bargain, by delaying two years 
the stipulated payment, and not performing the other 
parts of the treaty, his nation ought not to be held to 
their part of it, even if fairly entered into. But," said 
he, " the Osage nation has no right to sell its country, 
much less have a few chiefs, who have taken it upon 
themselves to do so ; our country belongs to our posterity 
as well as to ourselves ; it is not absolutely ours ; we re- 
ceive it only for our lifetime, and then to transmit it to 
our descendants. . . . No, my father, keep your goods, 
and let us keep our lands." To this statement, admit- 
ting its truth, there can be no answer, whether we regard 
it from an Indian's point of view, or whether we look 
upon it, as in fact we are bound to do, as the protest of 
a weak but independent people against the unjust pre- 
tensions of a powerful neighbor. Such, at all events, 
seems to have been the opinion of Governor Howard, who 
was appointed to office on the death of Captain Lewis in 
1809, and in whose hands the negotiation now rested. 
Instead of attempting to defend the course of the whites 
either in making the treaty or in carrying out its pro- 
visions, he contented himself with telling the chiefs that 
their great father did not compel the Indians to sell their 
lands, but that when they did they must adhere to the 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 103 

bargain ; " that the annuities for two years were ready 
for them : if they chose they might accept, if not it was 
of no consequence ; the land would still be considered 
as purchased, and their obstinacy would have no other 
effect than that of displeasing their great father." 

With this decision the Indians were obliged to be con- 
tent, and it speaks well for the influence of the chiefs 
who took part in this council and for their pacific dis- 
position that, notwithstanding the injustice with which 
they felt they had been treated, they were able and wil- 
ling to hold the fighting men of the nation to the terms 
of the treaty, except, perhaps, so far as it related to horse- 
stealing. Upon this point the Osages were incorrigible ; 
and whilst it was their boast that they had never shed 
the blood of a white man, the reclamations made upon 
them for stolen property were so numerous that they 
exceeded the amount of their annuities, and at a treaty 
made in September, 1818, the United States agreed to 
assume some four thousand dollars of their indebtedness 
in return for another liberal slice of territory, which the 
Indians duly relinquished. 

But whilst the Osages may be said to have submitted 
quietly to this wholesale appropriation of their land, 
there were portions of the tribes who claimed the re- 
gion north of the Missouri who were by no means dis- 
posed to bear with what they considered as a similar 
injustice. To understand the condition of affairs that 
prevailed along this portion of the frontier, it is neces- 
sary to bear in mind that, in 1803, when Louisiana was 
purchased, all of this part of what is now known as the 
State of Missouri, as well as the northwest quarter of 
Illinois and a part of southern Wisconsin, were claimed 
by the Sacs and Foxes and their allies the Iowas. Hav- 



104 MISSOURI. 

ing driven out the Missouris and practically destroyed 
the tribes that formed the Illinois confederacy, they 
held the most of this region by right of conquest ; and 
so far as our acknowledgment of this fact could give 
them a valid title, they were its undoubted owners, and 
they so continued until November, 1804, when they 
ceded to the whites all of their possessions east of the 
Mississippi, including the Rock River valley of Illinois 
and other favorite localities. In the same treaty they 
agreed that, west of the Mississippi, the boundary be- 
tween them and the whites should be a line drawn 
in a direct course from the Missouri River, opposite 
the mouth of the Gasconade, to a point on the Jef- 
freon River (Salt ? ) thirty miles above its mouth, and 
down the said Jeffreon to its junction with the Mis- 
sissippi. West and north of this line, they reserved all 
the rest of this portion of Missouri ; and there can be 
no doubt that, as against us, they held it by an indis- 
putable title until they sold it in August, 1824, — three 
years after Missouri was admitted into the federal Un- 
ion, though long before that time the whites had crossed 
the boundary, and were establishing themselves upon 
forbidden ground. 

To this treaty, especially to that portion of it which 
related to the cession of their lands in Illinois and Wis- 
consin, the Sacs and Foxes who lived east of the Mis- 
sissippi were bitterly opposed. They complained that 
the sale had been concluded by chiefs who were sent to 
St. Louis on other business, but who, while there, had 
been made drunk, and when in that condition had been 
induced to agree to it. For this reason they held, and 
justly, too, from their point of view, that it was not bind- 
ing ; and there is every reason to believe that the part 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 105 

which they took against us then, and in the war of 1812 
with England, was due not so much to the intrigues of 
British emissaries and traders, as it was to the deter- 
mination of the Indians not to give up their homes with- 
out a struggle. Their opposition, however, was of no 
avail. They were divided among themselves as to their 
true policy ; and though for several years, from the be- 
ginning of the war of 1812 until its conclusion in 1815, 
those of the Indians who took up the hatchet were able 
to keep the northern frontiers of Missouri and Illinois 
in a state of constant alarm, yet in the end they were 
obliged to succumb. The whites had become too nu- 
merous, and were too well organized, to be successfully 
resisted. Their leaders were men like Governor How- 
ard and his successor Clark, of Missouri, and Governor 
Edwards, of Illinois, who were familiar with every phase 
of border life, and who were as prompt in action as they 
were skilled in the arts of Indian warfare and diplo- 
macy. Under their direction, important points on the 
Illinois and Mississippi were garrisoned, forts, or " sta- 
tions " as they were called, were established at suitable 
intervals along the frontier, and troops were raised for 
service in the field, and for patrol duty on the rivers and 
in the more exposed districts. The Indians of the Mis- 
souri, too, especially the Sioux, were instigated to take 
up arms against the hostile tribes on the upper Missis- 
sippi ; and if we may credit the statement of Manuel 
Lisa, the agent employed in the matter, they did good 
service. 

By the adoption of these vigorous measures, the hos- 
tile Indians were held in check ; and the fighting, so 
far as there was any, may be said to have been confined 
to the efforts of the Americans to capture and hold 



106 MISSOURI. 

Prairie du Chien. With the exception of the expedi- 
tions undertaken for this purpose, and the defensive 
and retaliatory measures which were improvised in the 
different neighborhoods, the people of upper Louisiana 
were not called upon to take any active part in the war, 
or to bear, except in a general way, any of its burdens. 
Owing to the early successes of the Americans, the Eng- 
lish troops that might have been spared for service on 
the Mississippi were needed for the defense of the Ca- 
nadian frontier ; and the defeat of the Indians at Tip- 
pecanoe in 1811 had so shattered the strength of the 
confederated tribes that when, in 1812, on the outbreak 
of the war with England, Tecumseh called on them to 
take up arms against the United States, it was found 
that they were hopelessly divided among themselves, 
and that but a moiety of their warriors were ready to 
follow him into the British camp. Large and influential 
bands of the most hostile of the tribes, as for instance, 
the Shawnees and the Sacs and Foxes, refused to take 
any part in the war, preferring, as did those of their 
friends and congeners that lived west of the Missis- 
sippi, to trust to the friendship of the Americans, fatal 
as it sometimes proved, rather than to risk the chances 
of a collision. In such a contest, with the advantages 
all on one side, the result could not long be doubtful. 
A few desultory inroads were made into the territory by 
small parties, usually from the east side of the river, 
and occasionally an isolated cabin was destroyed and 
its inmates slaughtered ; but beyond this the Indians 
effected nothing. The time had gone by when they 
could reenact, here, the scenes which had marked the 
early struggle for Kentucky and the region between the 
Ohio and the Lakes. In the changed condition of affairs, 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 107 

the invasions in force, the determined attacks upon forti- 
fied positions, and the bloody battles that characterized 
that era were no longer possible. 

Under these circumstances, the struggle on the part of 
the Indians was soon seen to be hopeless even by them- 
selves. Accordingly, when the Treaty of Ghent made 
it incumbent on the United States to put an end to the 
hostilities against the tribes with whom they were then 
at war, they found the Indians ready to meet them half 
way. In response to the invitations that were sent out, 
representative chiefs from nearly all the hostiles tribes 
repaired, in the summer of 1815, to Portage des Sioux, 
a small village on the west side of the Mississippi a few 
miles above the mouth of the Missouri, where they were 
met by the American commissioners ; and as both par- 
ties were anxious for peace there was no difficulty in 
agreeing upon the terms. Among the tribes represented 
in this council were the Sacs and Foxes, or rather 
those of them who had adhered to the United States 
during the late war, and who on that account had been 
obliged to separate themselves from the rest of their 
nation and remove to the Missouri. The Rock River 
band, though, as it was called, still held out, and it 
was not until the next year that they finally gave in, 
and agreed to a settlement upon the basis of the treaty 
of 1804. 

With the conclusion of these treaties, Indian wars in 
the territory of Louisiana, and we may also add in the 
State of Missouri, came to an end ; for although the 
mad attempt, in 1832, of Blackhawk and his band to 
repossess themselves of the Rock River valley caused 
great alarm in the northeastern portion of the State, and 
volunteers were sent out to protect the settlers in that 



108 MISSOURI. 

quarter, yet the struggle, if that term can he applied to 
what seems to have been the last frantic effort of a small 
party of desperate men, was confined to the region east 
of the Mississippi, and was soon settled by the capture 
of Blackhawk and most of his warriors. Considered as 
a part of the history of Missouri, and with reference to 
the share taken by the State in suppressing it, this out- 
break is too insignificant to merit more than a passing 
notice. It has, however, a certain dramatic interest 
from the fact that President Lincoln and his whilom 
opponent Jefferson Davis — the former as a captain of 
Illinois volunteers, and the latter as lieutenant in the 
regular army — were both engaged in the pursuit and 
capture of this marauding band of savages. 

Returning from this digression, which has led us to 
anticipate by some years the current of events, and re- 
suming the thread of our narrative, it will be found 
that the concluding year of Governor Howard's admin- 
istration, memorable as it was in the history of the 
United States for the declaration of war with England, 
was notable in the local annals of the territory for cer- 
tain events which have been more or less far-reaching 
in their consequences. Prominent among these was the 
earthquake of 1811, by which the village of New Mad- 
rid and the settlements at Big and Little Prairie were, 
for the time being, practically broken up, and the sur- 
face of all that portion of the State was essentially 
changed. The first and one of the severest of these 
shocks, or series of shocks, was felt on the night of 
December 16, 1811 ; another of equal violence was ex- 
perienced some months later ; and after that they were 
repeated at intervals, but with lessening intensity, until 
finally, after the lapse of some years, they ceased alto- 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 109 

gether. Eye-witnesses have told us that these concus- 
sions were divisible into two classes, in one of which the 
motion was perpendicular, whilst in the other it was 
horizontal. Of these, the latter were the more destruc- 
tive ; " when they were felt, the houses crumbled, the 
trees waved together, and the ground sunk." The undu- 
lations at such times are described as resembling waves, 
which " increased in elevation as they advanced, and 
when they had attained a certain fearful height, the 
earth would burst, and vast volumes of water and sand 
and pit-coal were discharged, as high as the tops of the 
trees, leaving large crevices or chasms where the ground 
had burst." Lakes of twenty miles in extent and more 
were made in an hour, whilst others were drained, 
and whole districts were covered with white sand, so 
that they became uninhabitable. " Large tracts, includ- 
ing the graveyard at New Madrid with all its sleeping 
tenants, were thrown into the river ; " and " the whole 
country extending to the mouth of the Ohio in one di- 
rection, and to the St. Francis in the other, including 
a front of three hundred miles, was convulsed to such a 
decree as to create lakes and islands, the number of 
which is not yet known." 

Fortunately, the country was thinly settled, and as the 
cabins were low and built of logs it was not easy to over- 
throw them ; so that although many of them were shaken 
down, the loss of life resulting from this cause was 
small. In fact, if we except those who are said to have 
been drowned by the sinking of the boats in the river, 
of which there is no record, there were but two persons 
whose deaths can be attributed to the earthquake, and 
one of them " died from fright." The settlers, as soon 
as they saw that " the chasms in the earth were in direc- 



110 MISSOURI. 

tion from southwest to northeast, and that they were of 
an extent to swallow up not only men, but houses," im- 
mediately felled the tallest trees at right angles to these 
chasms, and upon these trees they took refuge when 
warned of an approaching shock. By this simple device 
" all were saved." As the people did not dare to dwell 
in houses, they passed this and the ensuing winter in 
booths and camps, such as were in use among the neigh- 
boring Indians. Meanwhile their crops were neglected 
and nearly all their cattle died. This was a serious loss, 
and would inevitably have resulted in a general scarcity, 
but, that so many heavily laden flatboats were wrecked, 
" and their contents driven by the eddy into the bayou 
near the village of New Madrid," that provisions of all 
sorts were in great abundance. Flour, beef, pork, 
bacon, butter, cheese, apples, in a word all the articles 
that usually found their way at this season of the year 
to the New Orleans market, were in such quantities 
" as scarcely to be matters of sale." 

After the violence of the earthquake had somewhat 
subsided, the country is said to have exhibited " a mel- 
ancholy aspect of chasms, of sand covering the earth, 
of trees thrown down or lying at an angle of forty-five 
degrees, or split in the middle." The settlement at 
Little Prairie was broken up, but two families remaining 
out of a hundred, whilst that at Big Prairie, one of the 
most flourishing on the west bank of the Mississippi, was 
greatly reduced, and New Madrid itself had sunk into 
insignificance, the people trembling in their miserable 
hovels at the distant rumbling of an approaching shock. 
Even as late as 1819, this district, " once so level, rich, 
and beautiful, still presented the appearance of decay. 
Large and beautiful orchards, left uninclosed, houses 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. Ill 

uninhabited, deep chasms in the earth, obvious at fre- 
quent intervals, — such was the face of the country, al- 
though the people had for years become so accustomed 
to frequent and small shocks, which did no essential in- 
jury, that the lands were gradually rising again in value, 
and New Madrid was slowly rebuilding with frail build- 
ings, adapted to the apprehensions of the people." 1 

In the mean time Congress had been appealed to, 
and had responded with an act allowing those whose 
lands had been damaged or destroyed by the earth- 
quake to locate the same quantity of land in any other 
portion of the territory that was open to entry. It was 
a generous provision, but it proved to be of but little 
benefit to the actual sufferers, for the reason that al- 
most all of them sold out their claims at a price which 
is said to have averaged less than ten cents per acre. 
" Out of five hundred and sixteen certificates issued, 
only twenty were located by the original claimants or 
sufferers. Three hundred and eighty-four were held by 
persons who resided in St. Louis, one of whom had 
thirty-three, another forty, another twenty-six, another 
sixteen, and others from one to five each." 

Unfortunate as was the failure of this act to effect 
the end desired, it was not the worst of the evils to which 
it is said to have given rise. Perjury and forgery fol- 
lowed in its train, and were so common that there came 
a time when a New Madrid claim was considered as a 
synonym for fraud. 2 According to Mr. H. W. Wil- 

1 Flint's Recollections, Letter XX. Boston, 1826. 

2 As a sample of the frauds perpetrated under this act we have 
the following 1 , taken from American State Papers, title Public 
Lands, vol. iv. p. 609 : — 

'A claim was made by one George Tenelle (who had eighteen 
other New Madrid claims) for two hundred and forty acres, 



112 MISSOURI. 

liams, whose familiarity with the land laws of Missouri 
entitles him to speak with authority, no less than one 
hundred and forty-two claims, set up by persons who 
falsely represented themselves to be the legal represent- 
atives of New Madrid sufferers, were confirmed ; and 
the holders were permitted to surrender lands which 
they never owned, receiving, in lieu thereof, certificates 
for location elsewhere. These certificates, as well as 
those that were genuine, were located throughout the 
State, wherever a desirable piece of land could be found, 
often without regard to prior claims, and this of course 
caused a vast amount of litigation, some of which has 
continued to our day. 

Of a totally different character, but not less influen- 
tial in its consequences, was the act of Congress of June 
13, 1812, which confirmed the titles of the inhabitants 
of the different villages of the territory to the lots 
which they had occupied prior to the 20th of December, 
1803 ; and which provided " that all town or village 
lots, out-lots, common-field lots, and commons in and 
adjoining and belonging to the towns or villages of the 
territory, which are not rightfully owned or claimed by 

which he claimed as assignee of Elisha Jackson, producing- docu- 
ments to that effect, and also proof, under oath, that the land 
had been materially injured by earthquakes. He obtained his 
certificate, and relinquished the injured land to the United States, 
It was then entered on the books of the land office as public 
land subject to entry. In 1825 it was entered by one Evans or 
Ogden, who proceeded to take possession. It then transpired 
that Jackson had sold the land in 1796, that the purchaser had 
constantly lived on it until he died in 1819, that one of his heirs 
had lived on it until it was claimed under the entry at the land 
office, and, further, that it was a valuable farm, which had never 
been injured by the earthquakes. ' ' — Scharf 's History of St. Louis, 
p. 328. Philadelphia, 1883. 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 113 

any private individual, or held as commons belonging 
to such towns or villages, or that the President of the 
United States may not think proper to reserve for mili- 
tary purposes, shall and the same are hereby reserved 
for the support of schools in the respective towns or 
villages aforesaid ; Provided, that the whole quantity 
of land contained in the lots reserved for the support of 
schools in any town or village shall not exceed one 
twentieth part of the whole lands included in the gen- 
eral survey of such town or village." 

With the first of these provisions we do not propose 
to concern ourselves further than to say that it was one 
of the amendments made to the law of 1804, to which 
we have already referred, and that whilst it brought re- 
lief to a number of deserving persons, whose cases had 
hitherto been ruled out under the stringent regulations 
of Congress, it also opened wide the door to fraud and 
perjury, by making a number of these claims depend 
for their validity upon the recollection by witnesses of 
events which, in some cases, had happened years before. 
Under these circumstances, and in view of the mania 
for speculating in land which at this time prevailed in 
the territory, the inducement to recollect circumstances 
that were, to say the least, of doubtful occurrence, was 
often very great, and it need not surprise us, therefore, 
to be told that weak human nature not infrequently 
yielded to the temptation. Out of some twenty-five 
hundred claims that were presented for confirmation be- 
tween the passage of this act and February, 1816, when 
the commissioners made their report, eight hundred 
were rejected ; and of this number, it is probably safe 
to say that a large majority were either notoriously 
fraudulent, or were based upon evidence that failed to 
establish either their character or amount. 



114 MISSOURI. 

For the second of these provisions, that by virtue of 
which certain lots were reserved for school purposes, we 
have only words of commendation. Its effect has been 
uniformly beneficial ; and it is a pleasure to be able to 
say that the grant has never been perverted from its 
original purpose, but that its sphere of usefulness has 
gone on steadily widening, and that it bids fair to be 
productive of even more good in the future than it has 
been in the past. It is no doubt true that, owing to sub- 
sequent legislation, the gift was somewhat shorn of its 
fair proportion before it was finally handed over to the 
State in 1831 ; but in spite of this fact, such was the 
number of these unclaimed lots, and so great has been 
their increase in value in certain favored localities, that 
in St. Louis alone they constitute the bulk of the real 
estate held by the schools for purposes of revenue, and 
furnish to-day an income which may be roughly esti- 
mated at from fifty to sixty thousand dollars per annum. 

For this magnificent gift the people of St. Louis, and 
of the other villages which shared in the bounty of Con- 
gress, are indebted to the exertions of Thomas F. Rid- 
dick, a Virginian by birth, and one of the earliest immi- 
grants to the territory. He was secretary to the first 
board of land commissioners, and by virtue of his office 
became cognizant to the fact that there were in each of 
the villages in the territory a number of lots for which 
no legal owners could be found. With rare foresight, 
he conceived tlie idea of securing them as the beginning 
of a fund for the support of common schools, and in ac- 
cordance with his suggestion the section quoted above, 
reserving them for this purpose, was inserted in the act, 
the primary object of which was to quiet land titles. 
When the proposition came before Congress, such was 



LOUISIANA TERRITORY. 115 

his interest in its success that he made the trip from 
St. Louis to Washington on horseback, and at his own 
expense, to urge its passage ; and it was owing to his 
exertions and those of Edward Hempstead, who then 
represented the territory, that it finally became a law. 

The last of the measures to which we find it necessary 
to refer at this time was the act of Congress of June 
4, 1812, by which, on the 12th of the December follow- 
ing, Louisiana was to be advanced from the first to the 
second grade of territories, and its name changed to 
Missouri. It was time that this change should come, 
for the territory had a population of over twenty thou- 
sand, exclusive of Indians. This was four times as 
many as were necessary, under the law for the govern- 
ment of the Northwest Territory, to entitle them to the 
promotion, and they had begun to grow restive under a 
mode of treatment which discriminated unfavorably be- 
tween them and their neighbors on the other side of 
the Mississippi. By the terms of this act, the territorial 
affairs were to be administered by a governor appointed 
by the President, and a general assembly consisting of 
a house of representatives elected by the people, and a 
legislative council of nine members, chosen by the Pres- 
ident from a list of eighteen returned to him hy the ter- 
ritorial house of representatives. In accordance with 
this law, Governor Howard issued a proclamation di- 
viding the territory into five counties instead of districts, 
as they had hitherto been called, and ordering an elec- 
tion to be held in the November following for a dele- 
gate to Congress, and for members of the territorial 
legislature. It was one of the last of his official acts, 
for soon after he was appointed a brigadier-general in 
the army, which position he held with honor to him- 



116 MISSOURI. 

self and advantage to the territory until his death in 
1814. 

After an interregnum oi some months, during which 
the duties of the office were satisfactorily performed by 
Frederick Bates, the secretary of the territory, Captain 
William Clark, the worthy companion of Merriwether 
Lewis in the expedition to the mouth of the Columbia, 
was appointed governor. It was a fortunate selection 
in view of the hostile relations that then existed between 
the whites and the tribes of the Northwest, and it was 
no doubt his skill in dealing with these people and the 
influence he had acquired over them that led to his ap- 
pointment. His administration proved successful, and 
he was continued in office until 1820, when Missouri be- 
came a State, though it was a year and more before she 
was formally admitted into the Union. At the election 
which then took place, Alexander McNair was chosen 
governor, but General Clark, as he was usually called, 
was still kept at the head of Indian affairs, and it was in 
this capacity that he negotiated the treaties of 1824-25, 
by which the Osages, Kickapoos, and Sacs and Foxes, 
relinquished the lands which they still held within the 
limits of the State. It was a position for which he was 
preeminently fitted, for with perhaps the exception of 
Sir William Johnston, there has never been a white man 
whose influence among these wild and wayward chil- 
dren of the forest was comparable with that which he 
wielded. Up to the day of his death in 1838, he was 
their tried and trusted friend and counselor ; and but 
few of them ever came to St. Louis (and in those days 
such an occurrence was by no means rare) whose first 
visit was not made to the " Red-head," the name by 
which he was known aniong them. 



CHAPTER VI. 

MISSOURI TERRITORY : 1813 TO 1821. 

During the eight years that Governor Clark was at 
the head of affairs, the territory, in spite of certain 
drawbacks, made rapid progress in wealth and popula- 
tion. For a year or two at the outset of his administra- 
tion, during the continuance of the war with England, 
the tide of immigration was somewhat interrupted ; but 
on the return of peace in 1815, it set in afresh and with 
increased force. In fact, so great was the rush from 
Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, and the Carolinas that 
the " Missouri Gazette " of October 26, 1816, was 
moved to exclaim that " a stranger witnessing the scene 
would imagine that those States had made an agree- 
ment to introduce the territory as soon as possible into 
the bosom of the American family." As many as one 
hundred persons are said to have passed through St. 
Charles in one day " on their way to Boone's lick, Salt 
River, or some other region which for the time being 
was the centre of attraction ; " and this rate was kept 
up for many days together." Many of these " movers " 
brought with them a hundred head of cattle, besides 
horses, hogs, and sheep, and from three to twenty slaves. 
The few rude ferries that were then in existence on the 
Mississippi were kept busy crossing them. 

As one of these long trains moved slowly through the 
woods or over the prairie, the huge wagons drawn by 



118 MISSOURI. 

four or six horses and loaded down with the household 
goods or "plunder," as it was called, of the family ; the 
cattle with their hundred bells ; the negroes, who, we 
are told " seem fond of their masters," and are quite as 
much delighted and interested in the migration ; and, 
finally, the mistress and her children strolling leisurely 
by the side of the heavily laden teams, " often stretch 
for three quarters of a mile or more along the road, 
and present a scene which is at once pleasing and patri- 
archal." As night comes on, the band halts near some 
creek or spring where there is a supply of wood and 
water. " The pack of dogs sets up a cheerful barking. 
The cattle lie down and ruminate. The huge wagons 
are covered so that the roof completely excludes the 
rain. The cooking utensils are brought out. The 
blacks prepare a supper which the toils of the day ren- 
der delicious ; and they talk over the adventures of 
the past day, and the prospects of the next." Mean- 
time they are going where the land is inexhaustibly fer- 
tile, and " where there is nothing but buffaloes and deer 
to limit the range even to the western sea." Well might 
the worthy preacher, in view of such a picture, exclaim 
that " it carried him back to the days of other years 
and to the pastoral pursuits of those ancient races, 
whose home was in a tent wherever their flocks found 
range." * 

When the immigrant arrived at his journey's end, his 
first business was to look out a suitable spot where he 
might open a farm and once more set up his household 
gods. This was not always an easy matter, especially 
if he were going to an unknown region or among stran- 
gers, for speculators beset his path at every turn and 
1 Flint's Recollections, p. 202. 



MISSOURI TERRITORY. 119 

confused him with glowing accounts of their own lands, 
whilst, at the same time, they decried the possessions of 
their rivals by all the arts known to the profession. 
Amid such a conflict of opinions, and in view of the di- 
versity of claims founded, some upon settlement and 
improvement rights, others upon Spanish or New Mad- 
rid grants, some of which had been confirmed, whilst 
others had not, it was often a difficult matter to decide ; 
but when, at last, a choice was made, the necessary log- 
cabins were soon raised, the neighbors all joining in and 
helping on the work. A field of suitable size was cleared 
and fenced after the Virginia fashion, and at the proper 
season a crop was " pitched." In due time it was har- 
vested, and ever after the Missouri farmer, with a mod- 
erate force, if gifted with health and possessed of a fair 
share of industry, was sure of food, shelter, and clothing, 
and was thus " as independent as it was fit that a man 
should ever get to be." 

It is true that, owing to their abundance, farm prod- 
ucts were often in but little demand, and that hence 
money was scarce and but little of it ever found its way 
into his possession ; but, on the other hand, it may be 
urged that except for the purchase of the necessary farm- 
ing implements or in the payment of his taxes, he had 
but little use for it, as the necessaries of life and many of 
its luxuries were within his reach without the expendi- 
ture of a dollar in cash. Thus, for example, the ma- 
terials for his clothing were grown in his own fields or 
sheared from his flocks, and their preparation and man- 
ufacture were among the duties that devolved upon the 
women of the family ; his cabin of logs, rude at first and 
soon replaced by the more ambitious frame house, gave 
him shelter ; while the woods and streams, his fields, 



120 MISSOURI. 

flocks, and well-filled " truck patch " or vegetable garden, 
all contributed to furnish forth a table that was as abun- 
dant as it was varied. 

Of foreign wines and brandies he, of course, had none ; 
but in a few years, when his orchard came into bear- 
ing, he had an abundance of cider, and if with increasing 
years he felt the need of a more potent stimulant, he was 
at liberty to convert the nutritious corn or the fragrant 
peach into the most seductive of liquors, without the 
fear of a visit from the tax-gatherer. Tea and coffee, 
too, were at times a recollection rather than a reality, 
and here, it must be confessed that the ingenuity of the 
housewife was at fault, as sassafras and rye furnished but 
poor substitutes for these well-nigh indispensable articles. 
However, he had an abundance of milk, or if he did not, 
it was generally his own fault ; and with a plentiful supply 
of maple syrup and honey, known as " long sweetening,'' 
he had no reason to complain of the absence of foreign 
sugar. 

Being thus relieved from the dread of poverty, the 
economic restrictions upon marriage that prevail in old 
communities had no existence among them, and a pru- 
dent father might reasonably expect to see his children 
comfortably settled about him, in homes of their own, 
long before his own days of usefulness were over. Land 
was cheap, and in two years an active, energetic young 
man might, by his own exertions, open a farm and be in 
a condition to support a wife and children. After this, 
the necessity for persistent, exhaustive labor would not 
be so great, as it was " calculated " that two days' work 
in Missouri would contribute as much to the support of 
a family as the labor of a week would do in the North. 
In good time the miller, the blacksmith, and the country 



MISSOURI TERRITORY. 121 

storekeeper would be attracted to the settlement, and 
soon the school, the church, and the post-office would 
follow. At this stage of progress the community would 
contain within itself the nucleus of the coming village 
and be virtually self-supporting. Soon there would arise 
the need of something more regular and authoritative 
than neighborhood law or custom, powerful as that was 
in newly-settled districts ; and steps would be taken for 
the establishment of courts and the enforcement of their 
decrees. At first the little community would be attached 
to the nearest county or judicial circuit, with the seat of 
justice perhaps a hundred miles away, but this was a 
mere temporary expedient ; and when, sooner or later, 
the requisite population was attained, a suitable extent 
of territory would be cut off and erected into a county, 
with judges, representatives, and all the other officers 
necessary to a separate political life. 

Such, in brief, was the process by which neighbor- 
hoods grew, and ultimately became welded into counties ; 
and some idea of the rate at which this was going on 
within the territory may be formed from the fact that, 
between 1812 and 1820, the counties had increased from 
five to fifteen, and the population, exclusive of Arkansas, 
which in 1810 amounted to twenty thousand souls, now 
numbered over sixty-six thousand, of whom about ten 
thousand were slaves. 

Of this increase, amounting in the ten years to over 
two hundred per cent., a large majority were farmers, 
and the gain in population, therefore, was chiefly in the 
agricultural regions, though the villages also felt the im- 
pulse and shared in the general prosperity. Especially 
was this true of St. Louis, which, owing to its advanta- 
geous situation, and to the fact that it was the political 



122 MISSOURI. 

capital of the territory as well as the depot for the pur- 
chase and distribution of supplies for the different mili- 
tary and trading-posts on the upper rivers, soon acquired 
a lead which it has ever since retained. In 1804, at the 
time of the purchase, there were in the village one hun- 
dred and eighty houses, consisting ordinarily of but one 
room, and built after the French fashion, which differed 
from the American in the fact that the logs, instead of 
being laid horizontally, were set upright in the ground, 
or upon plates, and were then connected by cross-pieces, 
the interstices in each case being filled in with stones 
and mud. A few of these houses, as for instance those 
of the Chouteaus and the government buildings, were of 
stones laid rough cast and coated with mortar ; and as 
they were " inclosed with massive stone walls like a 
demi-fortress," they may well have been regarded as 
palaces when compared with the more humble dwellings 
by which they were surrounded. All, however, were 
alike in having porches on one or more sides ; and as 
they were all whitewashed and usually stood in gardens, 
surrounded by fruit-trees, they appeared beautiful when 
seen from a distance, though most of them " were mean 
and comfortless when contemplated near at hand." 

As soon as the United States came into possession of 
all this region, " the influence of the guardian spirit of 
liberty," whatever that may mean, is said to have made 
itself felt, and the place rapidly lost the distinctive fea- 
tures of a French village. In 1809 it was incorporated 
as a town, and before the close of the second decade of 
the century there arose " lines of brick houses that would 
not have disgraced Philadelphia." By actual count it 
was found that in the spring of 1821 there were two 
hundred and thirty-two dwelling-houses of brick and 



MISSOURI TERRITORY. 123 

stone in the village as against four hundred and nine- 
teen of wood, to say nothing of warehouses, stables, 
shops, and outbuildings. Land, too, had increased enor- 
mously in value, and a few of the old French settlers, 
hostile as they were at first to the new regime, by pru- 
dently investing their savings in this form of property, 
had reaped the benefit of the advance, and were com- 
paratively rich. 

To facilitate intercourse between different parts of the 
territory, roads were cut out ; post-offices, too, were es- 
tablished, and routes opened between the different vil- 
lages and the east, though it was many years before the 
arrival and departure of the mails became either frequent 
or regular. In July, 1808, a newsjjaper was established, 
which under different names has continued down to the 
present time, and is now known as the " Missouri Repub- 
lican." It was the first paper published west of the Mis- 
sissippi River, but not the first in Louisiana, as one had 
been issued in New Orleans as early as 1794, while the 
Spaniards were yet in possession of that portion of the 
valley. 

A few good private libraries seem to have existed in 
the territory from the earliest times, notably that of 
Colonel Auguste Chouteau, which is said to have been 
strong in works relating to the early history of America, 
and was probably made up of books sent from France 
for the Jesuit College at Kaskaskia. It was not much 
used, if we may credit contemporary evidence ; and for 
some years after the purchase, but few new books were 
brought into the territory. To this rule, though, there 
must have been some honorable exceptions, as the li- 
brary of Mr. Secretary, Frederick Bates is spoken of 
with commendation, and in 1820 Bishop Dubourg is cred- 



124 MISSOURI. 

ited with having gathered together some eight thousand 
volumes. Besides this library, he had secured for the 
new cathedral, which was then in course of erection, a 
" collection of sacred vases, ornaments, embroideries, 
and paintings " that is said to have been without a rival 
in the United States. Among the paintings there were, 
so we are told, " originals by Raphael, Rubens, Guido, 
Paul Veronese, as well as by the modern masters of the 
Italian, French, and Flemish schools." It was also dur- 
ing this period that Governor Clark made a collection 
illustrative of the arts and industries of the Indians, 
which was open to the public, and which, to-day, would 
be of incalculable value to the ethnologist. 

Limited as was the supply of reading matter, it was 
fully equal to the demand, for among the old French 
settlers there was a large proportion who could not read, 
and the new-comers were so busy making farms, specu- 
lating in lands, and otherwise providing for their tem- 
poral wants, that they had no time to indulge in the 
luxury of reading. But while they were thus careless 
of their own literary improvement, they were by no 
means neglectful of the education of their children. 
Upon this point they displayed a commendable anxiety, 
and there were but few settlements in the territory so 
insignificant that they did not have, during some part of 
the year, a school, in which reading, writing, and a little 
arithmetic were taught. A lady who had resided two 
years at Fort Osage, some two hundred miles up the 
Missouri River, told Brackenridge " that descending the 
river on her return from that place, she had observed on 
the very spot, where on ascending she had seen a herd 
of deer, several children with books in their hands, re- 
turning from school." The settlement, it is added, had 



MISSOURI TERRITORY. 125 

been formed, and the school opened, during the two years 
that she had lived at the fort. 

According to the same writer there were in 1811 two 
schools in St. Louis, one English and one French ; and 
from other sources we learn that the former was " kept " 
by George Tompkins, who afterwards became chief jus- 
tice of the State, and the latter by Jean Baptiste Tru- 
deau, whose career as a teacher, extending from 1774 
to about 1825, covers a period of fifty years. Although 
only two are mentioned, yet there must have been others, 
as it was about this time that the " Missouri Gazette " 
contained the advertisement of the erratic C. F. Schewe, 
a graduate of the College of Berlin and of the Saxony 
School of Mines, who seems to have divided his time 
between teaching French and German and " moulding- 
candles out of deer's tallow." There were also Lancas- 
trian schools, Pestalozzi establishments, and institutions 
for " instruction mutuelle." Hebrew was taught in 
twelve lessons, and Latin and Greek with equal dis- 
patch, by professors whose knowledge of even their own 
mother tongue was exceedingly limited. Dancing, es- 
pecially the waltz, — then just introduced, — fencing 
and music (the piano and clarinet) were also taught ; 
and in a young ladies' academy, in addition to French 
and English grammar, geography, and arithmetic, the 
pupils were instructed in sewing and embroidery, and 
" their minds were enlightened and their hearts formed 
by a course of select reading either in ancient or modern 
history or morality." 

Of course these were all private institutions, as was 
the college founded by Bishop Dubourg, from which 
the St. Louis University may be said to have sprung. 
As yet there was no such thing in the territory as a 



126 MISSOURI. 

public school. Not until 1838, and after much tribula- 
tion, was one opened in St. Louis, though in 1817 the 
first step was taken towards organizing the system which 
has since grown into such magnificent proportions, by 
incorporating a board of trustees, whose duty it was to 
superintend the schools of that town. 

In 1811, at the time of Brackenridge's visit, the popu- 
lation of St. Louis amounted to about fourteen hundred, 
and was composed of Canadian French, a few Spaniards 
and other Europeans, with a somewhat larger propor- 
tion of Americans, to which may be added a slight 
sprinkling of Indians, half-breeds, and negro slaves. It 
was a motley crowd, and they differed among themselves 
as much in appearance, character, and occupation, as 
they did in nationality. Here might be seen the French 
paysan and the American farmer who was destined so 
soon to supersede him ; the boisterous, bragging, fight- 
ing boatman of the lower Mississippi and the gay, good- 
humored voyageur from Canada and the upper rivers. 
"Vagrant Indians still loitered along the streets, and 
now and then a stark Kentucky hunter," — the veritable 
gamecock of the wilderness, — " with rifle on shoulder 
and knife in belt, strode along. Here and there were 
new houses and shops just set up by bustling, driving, 
and eager men of traffic from the Atlantic States ; while, 
on the other hand, the old French mansions with open 
casements still retained the easy, indolent air of the 
original colonists ; and now and then the scraping of a 
fiddle, or strain of an ancient French song, or sound of 
billiard balls showed that the happy Gallic turn for 
gayety and amusement still lingered about the place." 
In appearance the town is said to have been less like 
a rural village than Ste. Genevieve or any of the other 



MISSOURI TERRITORY. 127 

French settlements, as the inhabitants depended upon 
trade for their support rather than upon agriculture. 
Indeed, it was owing to this fact, and to the scarcity 
which, in early times, it had sometimes occasioned, that 
St. Louis was derisively styled by its more fortunate 
neighbors Pain court, or "short loaf," as it may be 
roughly translated. We are also told that the town 
contained " twelve mercantile stores," and that the value 
of its imports amounted to two hundred and fifty 
thousand dollars per annum, which amount probably 
represents rather more than half the cost of all the 
goods annually brought into the territory. Except the 
sixty thousand dollars which the troops stationed at 
Belle Fontaine, near St. Louis, yearly put in circulation, 
almost all the rest of the domestic trade of this region 
was still carried on by barter. Lead and its product in 
the shape of shot, and peltry were most in demand, for 
the reason that, practically they were monopolies, and 
besides furnishing a recognized currency for the country, 
they were the two articles most eagerly sought after for 
shipment, as, no matter what the condition of the mar- 
ket in New Orleans or the Atlantic cities in regard to 
the other products of the territory, they always com- 
manded a ready sale at fair prices. 

Of the former of these articles, it was estimated that 
the Maramec mines alone produced, annually, one mill- 
ion five hundred thousand pounds, and " gave employ- 
ment to three hundred and fifty hands, exclusive of 
smelters, blacksmiths, and others." The Dubuque mines 
were not worked at this time, but those on the opposite 
side of the river, near Prairie du Chien, were ; and it 
may, perhaps, interest those of us who are concerned 
about the future of the Indians to know that, in 1811, 



128 MISSOURI.* 

the Sacs and Foxes, who still held the region where 
these " diggings " were situated, " having no other in- 
strument but the hoe," made five hundred thousand 
pounds of lead, which they sold to the traders, and which 
ultimately found its way down the river. A fair share of 
the lead produced in the territory was cast into shot, a 
tower for that purpose having been erected on a river 
bluff between Ste. Genevieve and St. Louis, as early as 
1809, by J. Maklot, who seems to have been the pioneer 
in this business. His shot is said to have equaled the 
best English patent ; and in the newspaper of that day 
the opinion is expressed that he would " be able to supply 
the Atlantic States on such terms as would defeat com- 
petition." 

The fur-trade, too, which, as we have seen, amounted 
in 1804 to two hundred thousand dollars per annum, 
was prosecuted with much vigor, though there is reason 
to believe that it was hardly as profitable as it had once 
been, and that its increase had not been commensurate 
with the growth of the commerce of the territory in other 
respects. In 1807-8, one year after the return of Lewis 
and Clark from their journey to the mouth of the Col- 
umbia River, Manuel Lisa, an experienced Indian trader, 
and one " who had few equals in perseverance and in- 
dustry," wintered on the Yellowstone at the mouth of 
the Big Horn. The next year, a company with a capi- 
tal of forty thousand dollars was formed for the purpose 
of " monopolizing," as it was said, " the trade of the 
tribes of the lower Missouri, who understand the art of 
trapping, and of sending a party to the head waters of 
that stream, strong enough to defend itself in case of 
necessity, and which should engage, practically, in the 
work of taking beaver and other skins." This was a 



MISSOURI TERRITORY. 129 

decided innovation, or rather an improvement, for hith- 
erto this branch of the business had been left almost 
altogether to the Indians, the trader being obliged to 
take the furs as they were brought to him, or to go with- 
out. Of course, so long as this was the case, there was 
always an element of risk growing out of the competition 
of the traders, and the irregular and uncertain habits of 
the Indians ; and it was to remedy this evil that the 
company proposed to employ white men, regularly, in 
the work of hunting and trapping, thereby giving to 
these pursuits a degree of stability which, thus far, they 
had not possessed. Accordingly, in 1809, Mr. Henry, 
one of the partners, started up the Missouri River at the 
head of two hundred and fifty men, and after establish- 
ing small trading-posts among the Sioux, the Arickaras, 
Mandans, and other tribes, he proceded to the three forks 
of the river, where he built a fort, and began at once 
the business of hunting and trapping as well as trading. 
It was a magnificent scheme, and one which promised a 
large measure of success, but unfortunately for the com- 
pany, all their plans miscarried ; and after a series of 
unforeseen misfortunes, the partnership was dissolved at 
the end of the time for which it had been formed. In 
spite of this apparent failure, the company, thanks to the 
energy of Lisa, saved its original investment, and began 
life afresh with a slightly increased capital. It met 
with no better success, however, and after a precarious 
existence of a few years, it gave way, in 1819, to still 
another, the third company, which is said to have bought 
it out for ten thousand dollars. At this time, if we may 
credit the report of Major Biddle, the whole amount 
of capital embarked in the fur-trade of the Missouri 
amounted to barely fifty-three thousand dollars, seven- 



130 MISSOURI. 

teen thousand of which, including the plant, belonged 
to the company, whilst the rest was owned by a number 
of individuals, among whom the Chouteaus were prom- 
inent. From these figures it is evident that the trade 
had not made any great increase, for even if a possible 
profit of five hundred per cent, be allowed, it would only 
carry the total to about three hundred thousand dollars ; 
and it is probable that this amount would cover, not 
only the receipts from the Missouri, but those from all 
other sources. 

To carry on this commerce, and transport the farm 
products, live stock, etc., that were annually sent down 
the river, various kinds of craft, as for instance the keel- 
boat, the barge, and the flatboat or " broad horn," were 
called into requisition. Of these, the two first mentioned 
were the most important, though not, perhaps, the most 
numerous, as they could be used for a return trip, whilst 
the flatboat could not, and was, therefore, broken up and 
sold at the end of the voyage. 

Some of these boats were of good size, carried as much 
as forty or fifty tons, and were owned and run by men 
who acted as " patrons " or captains, and who made the 
transportation of freight and passengers a regular busi- 
ness. In manning them it was the custom to proportion 
the number of the crew to the size of the cargo, one 
hand being allowed for every three thousand pounds. 
A trip from St. Louis to New Orleans and back usually 
occupied from four to six months, the upward voyage 
being especially long, laborious, and by no means free 
from danger. Even with the aid of sails and oars, it 
could not be made in less than an average of ninety 
days. Besides these means of propulsion, the crew were 
often obliged to resort to " warping, cordelling, poling," 



MISSOURI TERRITORY. 131 

and, when the occasion offered, to a process known as 
" bushwhacking," or pulling the boat forward by means 
of the bushes and willows that grew along the shore. It 
was a hard life, full of toil and danger, and developed a 
class of men each one of whom, in the vernacular of the 
river, claimed to be " half a horse and half an alligator." 

In truth, they were a wild and reckless set, ever ready 
for a fight or a frolic ; but to their credit be it spoken 
they were honest and true and patient after their fashion 
under labors and privations that would have daunted 
less resolute spirits. The best man in every crew was 
entitled to wear a feather or some other emblem as a 
challenge, which he was bound to make good against all 
comers ; and the worthy Mr. Flint, on the occasion of 
his first visit to St. Louis, was surprised to learn that the 
term " best " had no reference to the moral qualities of 
the possessor, but that it meant " he who had beaten, or, 
in the Kentucky phrase, had whipped all the rest." 

Such were the men and the methods employed in car- 
rying on the commerce of the valley when, in December, 
1811, the New Orleans, the first steamboat built west 
of the Alleghany Mountains, made the trip from Pitts- 
burgh to New Orleans, and thus settled at once and for- 
ever the question of the use of steam as a motive power 
upon the Western waters. Although the career of this 
vessel was very short, yet so satisfied were the people of 
the Ohio valley with the result of the experiment, that 
they went into the business of boat-building with an 
energy that must have savored of recklessness to any 
one not acquainted with the volume of trade that annu- 
ally floated down the Mississippi. In the eight years 
that intervened between 1811 and 1819, sixty-three 
steamers, varying in capacity from twenty to some hun- 



132 MISSOURI. 

dreds of tons, were constructed and running upon the 
Western rivers, and of these fifty-six were built on 
the Ohio, four at New Orleans, and one each at Phila- 
delphia, New York, and Providence, R. I. 

Rapid as was the increase in the number, size, and 
speed of these vessels, at first and for several years they 
found employment only on the Ohio and the lower Mis- 
sissippi, and it was not until the 2d of August, 1817, that 
the General Pike, Jacob Read master, the first steam- 
boat that ever ascended the Mississippi above the mouth 
of the Ohio, arrived at St. Louis. 

From the description that has come down to us, she 
must have been an ungainly sort of craft, with a hold 
constructed on the model of a barge, and a cabin situ- 
ated on the lower deck inside of. the " running boards." 
She had no wheel-houses and but one smoke-stack. 
The motive power was furnished by a low-pressure en- 
gine, reinforced occasionally by the exertions of the 
crew, who pushed the boat along with poles much as 
they had been accustomed to do with barges. She did 
not run at night, and this may partially account for the 
length of time she was on the way. In the course of 
the next few months she made other trips to and from 
Louisville, and in much better time. In October of the 
same year, another steamer, the Constitution, also 
reached St. Louis. During the ensuing season of 1818, 
thesQ arrivals and departures were more numerous, 
some of them from New Orleans, and the sight of a 
steamboat soon became so common as no longer to ex- 
cite the curiosity of the dwellers on the banks of the Mis- 
sissippi. As yet no attempt had been made to ascend 
the Missouri, and such was the swiftness of that stream 
that the result of an effort to stem its mighty current 



MISSOURI TERRITORY. 133 

was awaited with some anxiety, not to say doubt. At 
length the feat was accomplished ; and the return in 
June, 1819, of the Independence, Captain Nelson, from 
Old Franklin, a town situated about one hundred and 
fifty miles up the river and long since washed away, led 
to an outburst in the " Missouri Gazette," in which it was 
said : " The Missouri has hitherto resisted almost effectu- 
ally all attempts at navigation ; she has opposed every 
obstacle she could to the tide of emigration which was 
rolling up her banks and dispossessing her dear red chil- 
dren, but her white children, although children by adop- 
tion, have become so numerous, and are increasing so 
rapidly, that she is at last obliged to yield them her 
favor. The first attempt to ascend her by steamboat 
has succeeded, and we anticipate tho day as speedy, 
when the Missouri will be as familiar to steamboats as 
the Mississippi or Ohio." 

With the gradual increase in population and the con- 
sequent growth in the agriculture, commerce, and other 
material interests of the territory, the necessity for a 
better system of currency became daily more apparent. 
Lead, peltry, and tobacco, which had furnished the prin- 
cipal mediums of exchange during the days of the Span- 
ish regime, and useful as they still were in the way of 
barter, were no longer adequate to the demands made 
upon them, though as late as the winter of 1807 transac- 
tions were made upon the basis of a payment in furs. 
Even the supply of small change was totally insufficient, 
and Spanish dollars cut up into halves, quarters, and 
eighths or " bits " were made to do duty in this respect. 
For any less amount, pins, needles, sheets of writing- 
paper, and other articles of small value were used. 

To remedy this evil, the territorial legislature char- 



134 MISSOURI. 

tered the Bank of St. Louis, which went into operation 
in the summer of 1816, and in the following year the 
Bank of Missouri, with a capital of two hundred and 
fifty thousand dollars, was also organized. A partial 
list of the stockholders of this latter concern is pre- 
served, and it is of interest as showing the part which 
the French element of the population still played in the 
monetary affairs of the territory. Out of seven hun- 
dred and eighty shares held in the city of St. Louis, two 
hundred and seventy-six belonged to persons who were 
unmistakably French, or of French descent ; and among 
them we recognize the name of Charles Dehault Delas- 
sus as a subscriber for five shares. 

For a time the community felt the benefit of these 
institutions, and the volume of business was increased 
by the flood of money which they poured into the chan- 
nels of trade. The merchants not only imported more 
largely of goods and wares, but the spirit of speculation 
in land, which was already rife, received additional 
momentum. The people of the territory, one and all, 
appeared to be possessed with a mania for it. No claim 
was so indefinite, no title so uncertain, and no piece of 
property so shadowy, as not to find a purchaser. A 
tract of land, the only description of which was that it 
was situated thirty miles north of St. Louis, was put up 
at auction and actually bid off. Sometimes the same 
tract was offered by two or three claimants, and on one 
occasion the whole county of St. Charles, containing 
several thousand inhabitants, was sold for thirteen hun- 
dred dollars under a grant that had never been con- 
firmed. The immigrants, who were pouring into the ter- 
ritory in such a continuous stream, were possessed by the 
usual Anglo-Saxon land-hunger, and bought, or " took 



MISSOURI TERRITORY. 135 

up," more than they needed or could pay cash for, trust- 
ing to the future to be able to sell out at a profit and in 
time to meet their engagements. At this period, govern- 
ment lands were sold at two dollars per acre, one fourth 
cash and the balance in two, three, and four years, so that 
to enter a quarter section of one hundred and sixty acres 
required only a cash payment of eighty dollars. This 
was a temptation too strong to be resisted by the average 
immigrant, and consequently we are told that, for every 
eighty dollars brought into the territory, a quarter sec- 
tion was taken up, upon which two hundred and forty 
dollars, three fourths of the purchase money, was un- 
paid. The dealings with the stores, too, were largely 
increased, and were also upon credit, for with money in 
abundance, the merchant could afford to be liberal, and 
customers bought recklessly, as " every one expected to 
get rich out of the future emigrant. The speculator 
was to sell him houses and lands, and the farmer was to 
sell him everything he wanted to begin with and to live 
upon until he could supply himself. Towns were laid 
out all over the country, and lots were purchased by 
every one on credit ; the town-maker received no money 
for his lots, but he received notes of hand which he con- 
sidered to be as good as cash ; and he lived and em- 
barked in other ventures as if they had been cash in 
truth." 

In this way the year 1818 found almost everybody 
in debt, but this made no difference as long as immi- 
grants continued to arrive, and bank-notes, good, bad, 
and indifferent, circulated freely and without question. 
But when about 1819 settling day rolled around, and 
the stringency in the Eastern money market prevented 
the people who were desirous of immigrating from sell- 



136 MISSOURI. 

ing their lands, the flow of Eastern capital westward 
was checked, and as a consequence the local institutions 
were unable to respond to the demands made upon them 
by the United States Bank for specie, and were forced 
into suspension or hopeless bankruptcy. 

The merchants, feeling the pressure, called for a set- 
tlement of their outstanding claims, but in vain. Bank- 
notes had driven out the specie, and as they were now 
worthless, there was no longer any money in the coun- 
try with which to make payment. Farm products, it 
is true, were abundant, but they were unsalable. So, 
also, was real estate ; and then was presented the sin- 
gular spectacle of a people living in the midst of a 
rude plenty, who were practically without a circulating 
medium. They did not even have the means to pay 
their taxes ; and those of them who were so unfortunate 
as to owe a balance on their farms, be it ever so small, 
saw no way of saving them from forfeiture. At this 
stage of the crisis the general government came to the 
rescue, and devised " a system of relief which, by extend- 
ing the time of payment, and authorizing purchasers to 
secure a portion of their lands by relinquishing the re- 
mainder to the government, in the course of eight years 
extinguished a large portion of those debts, and eventu- 
ally . . . absorbed the whole without injury to the citi- 
zen, and with little loss to the government." The legis- 
lature, too, that had been called into existence by the 
enabling act of 1820, not to be behindhand in the work 
of relief, passed stay laws, and endeavored to accomplish 
the impossible feat of paying something with nothing. 
Among the other measures to which they resorted was 
the issue, in sums varying from fifty cents to ten dollars, 
of some two hundred thousand dollars' worth of certifi- 



MISSOURI TERRITORY. 137 

cates, which were predicated upon the credit of the State, 
and were to be loaned by commissioners, appointed for 
the purpose, to the citizens of the several " loan dis- 
tricts," upon certain conditions. These certificates were 
made receivable " not only for taxes and debts of what- 
ever kind due the State, but for the salaries and fees of 
all officers, civil and military, and in payment of salt 
sold by the lessees of Salt Springs." 

Owing to losses sustained by reason of insufficient se- 
curity, and to the adverse decision of the courts as to 
the constitutionality of the act under which they were 
issued, these certificates were discredited almost as soon 
as they were put in circulation ; and when they ceased 
to pass current, the holders of them were in a worse con- 
dition than they were before. Probably in no part of 
the West was the scarcity of money and the consequent 
derangement of business more keenly felt than in Mis- 
souri. Her people had been so generally engaged in 
speculative enterprises, and had so uniformly conducted 
their affairs upon a basis of credit, that the process of 
liquidation was severe, and that of recuperation slow. 

But whilst the closing years of this second decade of 
the century were a season of trial, the people of the ter- 
ritory, engrossed though they must have been with their 
private troubles, yet found time to devote to political 
affairs, and to securing for Missouri the position to which 
her population entitled her. By an act approved in 
April, 1816, she had been advanced to the third or 
highest grade of territorial government, and during the 
session of the legislature which met in November, 1818, 
and whilst the first mutte rings of the financial storm 
which soon spread over the whole country were but 
faintly heard in the distance, application was made to 



138 MISSOURI. 

Congress for authority to frame a constitution and es- 
tablish a state government. 

A bill to effect this purpose was at once introduced 
into the House, and in February, 1819, it came up for 
consideration. Mr. Tallmadge, of New York, then of- 
fered an amendment, making it a condition precedent to 
admission " that the further introduction of slavery or 
involuntary servitude shall be prohibited, except for the 
punishment of crimes, whereof the party shall have been 
fully convicted ; and that all children born within the 
State after the admission thereof shall be free at the age 
of twenty-five years." This amendment, in so far as it 
" restricted " their freedom of action, was exceedingly 
objectionable to the people of Missouri, and it also gave 
rise to a long and acrimonious debate in Congress, which 
convulsed the whole country and threatened the stability 
of the Union itself. Ostensibly, it was a protest in the 
interest of morality against the evil of slavery, and an 
effort to legislate it out of territory where it lawfully 
existed ; but in reality it was, as Rufus King frankly 
admitted, a struggle for political power, and it did not 
differ from that which had taken place in 1803, when the 
treaty for the purchase of Louisiana was under consider- 
ation, except in being aligned upon a different issue. The 
admission of Alabama in 1819 and the organization of 
the territory of Arkansas in the year following, without 
any restriction as to slavery and whilst the Missouri 
question was still pending, to say nothing of the addition 
to Missouri in 1836 of the Platte Purchase, — a territory 
larger than some of the States, — indicate very clearly 
that hostility to slavery was not at all times the control- 
ling motive of all of those who sought to prevent the 
increase of slave States. 



CHAPTER VII. 

THE MISSOURI COMPROMISE. 

To understand the condition of affairs that prevailed 
at Washington at this time, it is necessary to bear in 
mind that when the fifteenth Congress assembled, in 
December, 1817, the free States, as we shall call them, 
had acquired a large and constantly increasing prepon- 
derance in the House of Representatives, whilst in the 
Senate, with its representation based on States, not on 
population, the inequality was not so great ; and when 
Congress met in this year there were in the Union ten 
free and nine slave States, counting Delaware among the 
latter. Early in the session Mississippi was admitted, 
and in December, 1818, a year later, Illinois, a free State, 
was brought in, thus preserving the proportion between 
the two sections as it had existed at the time of the adop- 
tion of the Constitution, and as it had hitherto been main- 
tained. So far all had gone well, notwithstanding the 
delay that attended the admission of Kentucky, and it is 
possible that if the same rate of increase could have been 
kept up on both sides, the angry controversy which took 
place at this time and the ill-feeling which it engendered 
might have been indefinitely postponed. Such, however, 
was not the case. For reasons that seem to be inherent in 
the system of slavery the South spread territorially more 
rapidly than the North, and in the session of 1818-19, 
— the second of this Congress, — Alabama and Missouri, 



140 MISSOURI. 

two slave territories, applied for authority to frame con- 
stitutions, preparatory to their admission into the Union. 
This of course precipitated the issue as to the balance of 
power ; for, obviously, if these two applicants were to be 
brought into the Union with slavery, as in all probability 
they would elect to be, the proportion hitherto existing 
between the free and slave States would be destroyed, 
and the preponderance of power in the Senate would be 
handed over to the South. This the representatives from 
the North were determined to prevent, and to this end it 
was necessary either to defeat the admission of one of 
these territories, or to bring it in as a free State. 

So far as Alabama was concerned, Georgia, when 
ceding the territory out of which that State was subse- 
quently carved, had made certain stipulations in regard 
to slavery which were regarded as deciding, in the 
affirmative, the question of the existence of this form 
of labor in all that region. At all events, for this or 
some other equally good reason, there was no attempt 
made at Washington to dictate a constitution to the 
people of Alabama, and they were left free to come into 
the Union with or without slavery, as to them might 
seem best. To an unprejudiced mind, this appears to 
have been a just and fair method of settling the matter, 
or rather of letting it settle itself ; and as it had worked 
well in the case of Louisiana, it is difficult to under- 
stand why the same rule should not have been applied 
to Missouri, save on the theory that the balance of power 
required that if she were to come into the Union at this 
time, it must be as a free State. On no other ground can 
the action of Congress be explained and justified. The 
article in the Louisiana treaty which guaranteed to the 
people of that territory the possession of their property 



THE MISSOURI COMPROMISE. Ill 

including slaves, was certainly as sacred as was the 
clause in the Georgia deed of cession which is assumed 
to have legalized slavery in Alabama. So far, too, as 
the action of Congress could give them validity these 
two instruments stood upon an equal footing ; for both 
had been reaffirmed, the one by the admission of Louis- 
iana, and the other by that of Mississippi. In fact, the 
two cases are believed to be strictly analogous and were 
therefore equally binding. If, then, Congress had the 
power to forbid slavery in Missouri, it had the power to 
prohibit it in Alabama ; and it was clearly the duty of 
those who favored the Missouri "restriction," if they 
believed slavery to be the great evil which they said 
they did, to have insisted upon doing so, even though 
it involved them in as utter disregard for the Georgia 
deed of cession as they subsequently showed for the 
Louisiana treaty. Such, however, does not appear to 
have been their opinion, for in December, 1819, Alabama 
was received into the Union with slavery, and without 
any serious opposition on their part, at the very time 
that they were insisting most strenuously upon forcing 
the people of Missouri to adopt a clause in their con- 
stitution which should put an end to slavery, under 
penalty of being refused admission into the sisterhood 
of States. 

Out of this measure, as formulated in the amendment 
of Mr. Tallmadge, of New York, sprung up a debate, in 
which, for the first time, parties were divided by a geo- 
graphical line, and in which hot words and threats were 
bandied to and fro with a frequency and freedom that 
showed how deep and determined was the feeling that 
underlaid the struggle. On the part of those who op- 
posed the imposition of this " restriction," as it was 



142 MISSOURI. 

called, upon the people of Missouri, it was contended 
that the measure was contrary to the precedents estab- 
lished by Congress in the cases of Kentucky, Tennessee, 
Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama, all of which had 
been admitted into the Union with slavery; that it in- 
fringed upon that article in the treaty of purchase which 
guaranteed to the people of Louisiana the possession of 
their property ; and that Congress had no power to 
prescribe to a State any particular form of government, 
other than that it should be republican ; and that even 
if they had the abstract power, it would be folly to use 
it, since the people of the State would have a perfect 
right to change or amend their constitution whenever, 
and in whatever way, they might think proper. 

In answer to these arguments, it was objected that 
Congress had imposed restrictions upon other States, as, 
for instance, in the case of Louisiana ; that in the bill 
now under consideration, there was a clause which for- 
bade Missouri to tax, for five years, the lands that had 
been granted to soldiers ; and that even if this were not 
so, the power to admit, or to refuse to admit, a State, 
which Congress unquestionably possessed, necessarily 
carried with it the power to impose the conditions upon 
which such State should be admitted. In regard to the 
argument based upon the treaty of purchase and the in- 
fringement which this amendment, if adopted, would 
work in the rights of property, it was held that slavery 
existed only in virtue of local law ; that it was not only 
unrepublican in its nature, but it was also a moral wrong 
as well as a political and economical evil ; and hence, no 
matter if the treaty and the subsequent enactments of 
Congress did sanction it, self-interest and a higher law 
demanded that it should be abolished. These objec- 



THE MISSOURI COMPROMISE. 143 

tions were urged with great warmth and persistency, 
and there can be no question as to the influence they 
exerted upon the people of the North, though a mo- 
ment's reflection will convince any fair-minded person 
that they were more specious than solid. If the effort 
to extinguish slavery in Missouri had been in conformity 
with the will of the people of that State, and in undoubted 
accord with the treaty of purchase and the Constitution 
of the United States, the position of those who favored 
the " restriction " would have been absolutely impreg- 
nable. But this was not the case, and hence the anal- 
ogy which, it was claimed, existed between this restric- 
tion and those which had been imposed on other States 
fell to the ground. So, also, in regard to the wrong and 
the evil of slavery, both of which, we may remark in 
passing, were admitted. Indeed, on this point the rep- 
resentatives from the South went quite as far as did 
their neighbors from the North ; and it is probably safe 
to say that, as an original proposition, any measure that 
looked to the introduction of slavery into territory then 
free would have found but few defenders. But this 
was not the point at issue, and its discussion was there- 
fore irrelevant. The question to be decided was whether 
Congress had the right to abolish slavery in a region 
where it legally existed, regardless of treaty stipulations 
and of the wishes of the people most directly inter- 
ested. It was, it will be seen, a matter of law, not 
of morality; and in justice to themselves and to their 
friends and kindred who had immigrated to Missouri, 
the South could not afford to surrender the point. 
Accordingly, they planted themselves upon their con- 
stitutional rights and the faith of treaties, and though 
this position was hotly contested at the time, yet, to-day, 



144 MISSOURI. 

there are probably few who will venture to question 
its legality, whatever may be thought of its morality. 
As a matter of law, there can be no doubt that Mis- 
souri was entitled to admission in 1820, and with slav- 
ery, if her people so willed it, just as Louisiana had 
been in 1812, and as Arkansas was in 1836 ; and 
the attempt on the part of one branch of Congress to 
force her people to do away with slavery as a sine qua 
non of admission into the Union was, as was afterwards 
affirmed by the supreme court, a stretch of power not 
warranted by the Constitution, and therefore illegal. 
Upon this point the argument of John Quincy Adams is 
unanswerable. Speaking, some years later, on the mo- 
tion to admit Arkansas, he said : " She is entitled to 
admission as a slave State ... by virtue of that article 
in the treaty for the acquisition of Louisiana which se- 
cures to the inhabitants of the ceded territories all the 
rights, privileges, and immunities of the original citizens 
of the United States ; and stipulates for their admission, 
conformably to that principle, into the Union. Louisi- 
ana was purchased as a country wherein slavery was 
the established law of the land. As Congress have not 
power in time of peace to abolish slavery in the original 
States of the Union, they are equally destitute in those 
parts of the territory ceded by France to the United 
States under the name of Louisiana, where slavery 
existed at the time of the acquisition. . . . Arkansas," 
or Missouri, for the argument applied equally to her, 
" therefore, comes, and has the right to come, into the 
Union with her slaves and her slave laws. It is writ- 
ten in the bond, and however I may lament that it was 
so written, I must faithfully perform its obligations." 1 

Benton's Abridgment of the Debates, vol. xiii. p. 33. 



THE MISSOURI COMPROMISE. 145 

In spite of the strength of this position and the doubts 
that must have prevailed as to the validity of a con- 
trary course, the opponents of the " restriction " were 
outvoted, and the amendment of Mr. Tallmadge, abol- 
ishing slavery in Missouri (for that was what it amounted 
to), was carried. When the measure came before the 
Senate, this feature was stricken out by a decided vote, 
and the bill was returned to the House in the shape in 
which it had been originally introduced. This body 
refused to concur in tho change, and as the Senate ad- 
hered to its position, the fifteenth Congress adjourned 
without coming to any agreement, and the bill was 
lost. 

With the opening of the new Congress, in December, 
1819, the question again came up, but under somewhat 
different auspices. The House, it is true, showed very 
plainly that it was not prepared to abandon the position 
it had taken in favor of abolishing slavery in Missouri ; 
but the application of Maine for admission into the 
Union, which was made about this time, enabled the 
Senate to exercise a little gentle pressure upon their 
neighbors of the lower house by a resort to the well- 
known device of coupling the two measures into one and 
the same bill. This was done, and with a candor that 
was worthy of a better cause, the opponents of the Mis- 
souri restriction in both houses of Congress declared that 
the two measures must stand or fall together ; that un- 
less Missouri was admitted into the Union and without 
conditions as to slavery, Maine should be kept out. This 
brought on a debate, which ran through several weeks, 
and finally culminated in a dead-lock, the appointment 
of a committee of conference, and the adoption of a 
measure, or rather a series of measures, known as the 



146 MISSOURI. 

Missouri Compromise. By the terms of this agreement, 
which, it may be well to observe, was understood and not 
expressed, the clause prohibiting slavery was stricken 
from the bill authorizing the people of Missouri to form 
a constitution. This left them nominally free to or- 
ganize the State with or without slavery, as they might 
prefer, but without any express guarantee as to its ad- 
mission into the Union, though it seems to have been 
clearly understood that this was to be the effect of the 
measure. In return for this concession, which, in the 
light of a subsequent decision of the supreme court, 
yielded nothing, Maine was brought into the Union,' and 
a provision was inserted into the Missouri bill, by which 
it was stipulated that slavery should be excluded from 
all " the territory ceded by France to the United States, 
under the name of Louisiana, north of thirty-six degrees 
and thirty minutes north latitude." 

In securing the adoption of this compromise, if that 
term can be truly applied to a transaction in which one 
party gained everything and conceded nothing, the rep- 
resentatives of the free and relatively populous North 
achieved a decided success. For the first time in the 
history of the country, they had openly attempted to 
limit the power of the South by preventing the admis- 
sion of a slave State, and they certainly had no cause to 
be dissatisfied with the result of the experiment. By 
the admission of Maine, they had regained the suprem- 
acy in the Senate which was temporarily lost when 
Alabama came into the Union ; and if they had not suc- 
ceeded in carrying a measure for the abolition of slavery 
in Missouri, they had secured the passage of a law by 
which all that vast domain situated north of the line of 
thirty-six degrees and thirty minutes north latitude, and 



THE MISSOURI COMPROMISE. 147 

lying between the Rocky Mountains and the Mississippi 
River, was transformed, as far as an act of Congress 
could effect that purpose, from possible slave to actual 
free territory. 

Like all arrangements that are based upon expedi- 
ency alone, this agreement was not lasting. Subse- 
quent Congresses did not hesitate to violate it whenever 
it suited their purposes to do so ; and individual States, 
even those that had most to gain by insisting upon its 
observance, indicated clearly what they thought of its 
character when they declared, as Massachusetts did in 
1845, that they did not intend to abide by it. In fact, 
neither of the great political parties ever regarded it as 
being peculiarly sacred save when there was something 
to be gained by so doing. As early as 1836 it was vio- 
lated, and that without a protest on the part of the North, 
by the addition to the State of Missouri of the triangle 
known as the Platte purchase ; in 1854 it was formally 
abrogated ; and in 1857 it was pronounced unconstitu- 
tional in an obiter dictum opinion of the highest tribunal 
in the land. 

This was certainly a most lame and impotent conclu- 
sion, but for this verdict the Southern men who had 
sanctioned the compromise were not responsible. In 
good faith, and in the interest of peace and the Union, 
they had sacrificed what they believed to be, and what 
have since been decided to have been, their constitutional 
rights ; and, so far as they could, they had dedicated to 
freedom a much larger extent of country than that which 
their fathers had given, when in 1787, by a vote of five 
slave and three free States, they had passed the famous 
ordinance that made free all the region north of the 
Ohio and south of the Lakes. In so doing they certainly 



148 MISSOURI. 

had not been guilty of any act of aggression, whatever 
else it may have been ; and the fact that a majority of 
them in each house, small though it was, were willing 
to make the concession is proof not only of their devo- 
tion to the Union, but it indicates very clearly what are 
believed to have been their sentiments, at this time, in 
regard to the extension of slavery. 

Were other evidence on this point necessary, it may 
be found in the ratification by the Senate, at this very 
session of Congress, of the treaty with Spain, in virtue 
of which all of Louisiana territory south of the line of 
thirty-six degrees and thirty minutes, except Arkansas 
and a strip reserved for certain Indian tribes, was ex- 
changed for the Floridas. Of the merits of this treaty, 
or of the hidden motives that may have led the Southern 
members to vote for its ratification, it is not my province 
to speak. All that it concerns us to know is the fact 
that, in relinquishing their claims to all this region, the 
United States sold the only territory they owned west 
of the Mississippi, except Arkansas, into which slavery 
could be legally carried. Indeed, if we also except Flor- 
ida, which was acquired by the treaty, there was not 
then a foot of land on either side of the Mississippi, be- 
longing to the United States, in which slavery had not 
been extinguished, and that with the approval and by 
the votes of Southern slaveholders. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

THE ADMISSION OF MISSOURI INTO THE UNION. 

Although the adoption of this compromise put an 
end to the attempt on the part of the North to abolish 
slavery in Missouri, it did not secure her admission into 
the Union, neither was it the work of Henry Clay. The 
honor of having suggested it as a means of escape from 
a dead-lock which threatened the integrity of the Union 
belongs to Jesse B. Thomas, a senator from Illinois, and 
a Southern man by birth, though it is proper to add 
that Mr. Clay lent to the measure the weight of his 
great name and abilities, and that it probably could not 
have been carried without his assistance. What he 
really brought about, and what earned for him the title 
of the peace-maker, was the adoption of a second com- 
promise, by virtue of which Missouri was admitted into 
the Union, not in the usual way, but through a sort of 
side door, opened to her in return for a certain conces- 
sion which she was assumed to have made. 

As a compromise, using this term in its usual accepta- 
tion, this second measure was as one-sided as the first, 
but differed from that in being altogether in the interest 
of the South. By it, a few Northern men (fourteen in 
the House, and eight in the Senate), joined to an almost 
solid Southern vote, were able to secure the admission 
of Missouri, on the condition that her legislature should 
adopt a " solemn public act," which was ostensibly a 



150 MISSOURI. 

modification, or rather a repeal, of an article in the con- 
stitution she had just adopted, and which, therefore, from 
its nature, was of no binding force, moral or legal, upon 
any human being whatsoever. 

To understand this curious page of legislative history, 
it is necessary to transfer the field of investigation from 
Washington to Missouri, and note briefly the change 
which the adoption of the first, or Missouri Compro- 
mise proper, had wrought in the political condition of 
the people of the territory. 

For a few years previous to this time, ever since 1816, 
they had been living under the third or highest form of 
territorial government, but when the news of the passage 
of this " act " reached them, they at once took steps to 
organize the State. An election was held for members 
of a convention which met in June, 1820, and proceeded 
to frame a constitution. It was a fairly representative 
body, and numbered among its members some who were 
afterwards called upon to play conspicuous parts upon a 
more extended theatre. As might have been expected, 
it was composed altogether of men who were in favor 
of making Missouri a slave State, though they were not 
necessarily in favor of a still further extension of the 
slave area ; and it is a curious commentary upon the 
changes that subsequently took place in men and meas- 
ures that Edward Bates, who was attorney-general un- 
der President Lincoln, and one of the best and purest 
men this country has produced, was one of its members, 
having been returned from St. Louis in the pro-slavery 
interest. The fact is that the attempt of the Northern 
representatives to regulate the domestic affairs of the 
territory had reacted upon themselves, and instead of 
strengthening the hands of their friends, it had alienated 



ADMISSION INTO THE UNION. 151 

not a few, even of those who agreed with them upon the 
question of slavery. It was looked upon as a high- 
handed effort at usurpation, and such was the opposition 
it provoked within the State that, owing to this and to 
other causes that will readily suggest themselves, no one 
whose views upon the slavery question were in the least 
doubtful stood any chance of an election. Even among the 
free-state men the issue had become so complicated that 
the " Missouri Gazette," whose editor, Joseph Charless, 
was one of the leaders on that side, declared, on one oc- 
casion, when speaking of the effort in Congress to abol- 
ish slavery in the incoming State, that " the question 
was not whether slavery shall or shall not be prohibited, 
. . . but whether we shall meanly abandon our rights 
and suffer any earthly power to dictate the terms of our 
constitution." 

After a session of a little over a month, and an ex- 
penditure for stationery, etc., of a total of twenty-six 
dollars and twenty-five cents, the convention adjourned, 
having completed the work for which it had been called 
together. The constitution, as adopted, was not sub- 
mitted to a vote of the people for ratification, but took 
effect of its own motion. It did away with the territo- 
rial government, and provided for the election of officers, 
state as well as national. In August of that year this 
election was held, and the officers then chosen were duly 
inaugurated ; and although it was a year and more be- 
fore Missouri was finally admitted into the Union, yet 
the wheels of her government were promptly set in mo- 
tion, and she found herself occupying the somewhat 
anomalous position of a State outside of the Union. 

Of course this constitution sanctioned slavery. That 
was a foregone conclusion : but as it was the very con- 



152 MISSOURI. 

tingency against which the compromise that had been 
so recently adopted was intended to provide, it did not 
furnish any just and tenable ground for opposing the 
admission of the State. So far as the Southern rep- 
resentatives were concerned, they had complied with 
their part of the agreement. Maine had been received 
into the Union ; slavery had been excluded from all the 
rest of Louisiana, or Missouri territory as it was then 
called, north of thirty-six degrees and thirty minutes, so 
far as an act of Congress could effect that purpose ; and 
it now only remained formally to advance Missouri to 
the dignity of a State, in order to carry out in full the 
well-understood terms of the compromise. This a large 
majority of the Northern representatives were unwilling 
to permit, so long as her constitution sanctioned slavery. 
They had voted steadily and up to the very last to make 
Missouri a free State, regardless of the wishes of her 
people ; and for them now to wheel around and consent 
to receive her into the Union with slavery would have 
indicated a change of heart too sudden to be genuine, 
and one which, in the temper then prevailing at the 
North, they might have found it difficult to explain and 
defend. Besides, although they had been temporarily 
defeated upon the question of prohibiting slavery in the 
State, yet the contest had been close, and there were 
not a few among them who did not despair of ultimate 
success, though they seem to have recognized the pro- 
priety of shaping their course so as to avoid, if possible, 
the appearance of coming to an open conflict with the 
recently adopted compromise. Accordingly, when the 
constitution which the State of Missouri had adopted 
was presented for approval, they seized upon the clause 
rendering it obligatory upon the legislature to enact a 



ADMISSION INTO THE UNION. 153 

law to " prevent free negroes and mulattoes from com- 
ing to and settling within the State," and made it the 
occasion for renewing the struggle. Free negroes, they 
contended, were recognized as citizens in some of the 
old States, and as emigration was a privilege possessed 
by all citizens, they insisted upon the rejection of Mis- 
souri's application, on the ground that this article was 
contrary to that provision of the federal Constitution 
which guaranteed to " the citizens of each State the priv- 
ileges and immunities of citizens in the several States." 

That this was a mere pretext, intended to cover up 
the real grounds of their opposition, hardly admits of a 
doubt. The fact that, at this time, there was, probably, 
not a single State, north or south, that did not in some 
shape discriminate against blacks and in favor of whites 
certainly indicates it ; and if further proof be required, 
it will be found in the chance utterances of different 
speakers during the course of the debate, in the proceed- 
ings of the legislature of at least one of the Northern 
States, and in the fact that if the objectionable article 
came in conflict with the federal Constitution, as it 
was said to do, it was, ipso facto, null and void, and 
would be so decided by the supreme court, whenever the 
matter came up for adjudication. However, be this as 
it may, it served the purpose for which it was intended ; 
and whether the objection to which it gave rise was 
feigned or real, it furnished the opponents to the admis- 
sion of Missouri with what they most needed, — a plau- 
sible excuse for keeping her out of the Union without an 
open violation of their part of the compromise. To all 
outward appearance, they now opposed her admission, 
not because she had legalized slavery, but because she 
proposed to do as some of her neighbors had already 



154 MISSOURI. 

done, and as one of them did as late as 1846, — prevent 
an undesirable class of persons from settling within her 
borders. In urging this objection they were apparently- 
occupying high constitutional grounds, but in reality 
their opposition was simply a continuation of the struggle 
which had been begun some two years before ; and dis- 
guise the fact as we may under high-sounding phrases 
and nice verbal distinctions, it was, after all, but another 
attempt on the part of the North to prevent the increase 
and limit the power of the South. That it was a move- 
ment in the interest of morality and a higher civiliza- 
tion may be admitted, but that will not alter the fact. 
The path was different, though the end aimed at was the 
same. 

In the debate which grew out of this question some of 
the ablest men in the nation took part. The evils of 
slavery, the value of the Union, the terms of the Louisi- 
ana treaty, the true intent and meaning of the Missouri 
Compromise, and the powers of Congress in the premises 
were all discussed at length, but to no purpose. The 
key to the debate lay in the interpretation that was to be 
put upon that clause in the federal Constitution, according 
to which " the citizens of each State shall be entitled to 
the privileges and immunities of citizens of the several 
States," and upon this point opinions were hopelessly 
divided. Even Charles Pinckney's declaration that when 
he drew up this clause " there was not such a thing in 
the Union as a black or colored citizen," and that con- 
sequently it could not have been intended to include that 
class of persons, important as it was to a proper under- 
standing of the provision, seems to have had little or no 
weight in bringing about a decision. Under the circum- 
stances, and from a political point of view, it was more 



ADMISSION INTO THE UNION. 155 

important to interpret the Constitution so as to make it 
fit the changed condition of affairs than to find out what 
the framers of that instrument had intended to say. 
Accordingly, when it was urged that free blacks were 
not citizens in the sense of the Constitution, it was re- 
plied that now they were citizens in some of the States, 
and that the Constitution spoke of citizens of the " sev- 
eral States," and not of citizens of the United States. In 
answer to this, it was shown that if this interpretation 
prevailed, it would be possible for one State to impose 
citizens upon another ; and that it might be made to 
grant to a free colored citizen, say of Massachusetts, 
immigrating to Missouri, rights and privileges in the latter 
State which he did not possess in the former, both of 
which propositions were declared to be absurd. In this 
way the debate ran on from day to day and week to 
week, only to end at last in a disagreement, the Senate 
being in favor of the admission, whilst the House was 
opposed to it. 

In this condition of affairs Mr. Clay found his oppor- 
tunity ; and he introduced a resolution to appoint a joint 
committee, " to consider and report to the Senate and 
House respectively whether it be expedient or not to 
make provision for the admission of Missouri into the 
Union on the same footing as the original States, . . . 
and if not, whether any other, and what provision, 
adapted to her actual condition, ought to be made by 
law." This resolution was carried by an overwhelming 
vote in both branches of Congress ; and a committee, of 
which Mr. Clay was chairman, and which, so far as the 
House was concerned, he may be said to have named, 
was appointed. In due time it reported a resolution ad- 
mitting the State, provided its legislature " by a solemn 



156 MISSOURI. 

public act " shall declare that the clause in the constitu- 
tion relating to the immigration of free negroes into the 
State shall never be construed to authorize the passage 
of any law, by which " any citizen of either of the States 
in this Union shall be excluded from the enjoyment of 
any of the privileges and immunities " to which he is en- 
titled under the Constitution of the United States. It 
was also provided, and the reason for it is obvious, 
" that when this declaration shall have been made, and 
a copy of it furnished to the President, he shall, by proc- 
lamation, declare the State to be admitted." This reso- 
lution was passed without discussion, having been carried 
in the Senate by a vote of 28 to 14, and in the House, 
where the contest was close, by 86 to 82, fourteen mem- 
bers from the non-slaveholding States voting in the affir- 
mative, whilst a few Southerners are to be found on the 
other side. 

With the adoption of this measure the Missouri ques- 
tion passed out of the hands of Congress, and it now only 
remained for the legislature of that State to go through 
with the farce of pretending to set aside a constitutional 
provision. This they did with commendable alacrity, 
though they evidently were well aware of the extent of 
their own powers, and had a keen sense of the absurdity 
of the part they were called upon to play. After recit- 
ing the act of Congress containing the condition under 
which Missouri was to be received into the Union, they 
went on to declare that, " forasmuch as the good people 
of this State have, by the most solemn and public act in 
their power, virtually assented to the said fundamental 
condition, when, by their representatives in full and free 
convention assembled, they adopted the constitution of 
this State, and consented to be incorporated into the 



ADMISSION INTO THE UNION. 157 

federal Union, and governed by the Constitution of the 
United States, which among other things provides that 
the said Constitution and laws of the United States, made 
in pursuance thereof, and all treaties made or which 
shall be made under the authority of the United States, 
shall be the supreme law of the land ; and the judges in 
every State shall be bound thereby, anything in the con- 
stitution or law of any State to the contrary notwith- 
standing. And although this general assembly do most 
solemnly declare that the Congress of the United States 
have no constitutional power to annex any condition to 
the admission of this State into the federal Union, and 
that this general assembly have no power to change the 
operation of the constitution of this State, except in the 
mode prescribed in the Constitution itself, nevertheless, 
as the Congress of the United States has desired this 
general assembly to declare the assent of this State 
to said fundamental condition, and forasmuch as such 
declaration will neither restrain nor enlarge, limit nor 
extend, the operation of the Constitution of the United 
States or of this State ; but the said constitutions will 
remain in all respects as if the said resolution had never 
passed, and the desired declaration was never made ; 
and because such declaration will not divest any power 
or change the duties of any of the constitutional authori- 
ties of this State or of the United States, nor impair the 
rights of the people of this State, or impose any additional 
obligation upon them, but may promote an earlier en- 
joyment of their vested federal rights, and this State be- 
ing, moreover, determined to give to her sister States and 
to the world the most unequivocal proof of her desire to 
promote the peace and harmony of the Union — there- 
fore 



158 MISSOURI. 

" Be it enacted and declared by the General Assembly 
of the State of Missouri, and it is hereby solemnly and 
publicly enacted and declared, That this State has as- 
sented and does assent that the fourth clause of the 
twenty-sixth section of the third article of the constitu- 
tion of this State shall never be construed to authorize 
the passage of any law, and that no law shall be passed 
in conformity thereto, by which any citizen, of either of 
the United States, shall be excluded from the enjoyment 
of any of the privileges and immunities to which such 
citizens are entitled under the Constitution of the United 
States." 

Upon the receipt of a certified copy of this act, which, 
considered with reference to the preamble which accom- 
panied it, can hardly be called solemn, President Mon- 
roe issued a proclamation announcing the fact of its pas- 
sage, and declaring that the admission of Missouri was 
complete. This proclamation bears date the 10th of 
August, 1821, and consequently that is the day upon 
which Missouri took her place in the sisterhood of 
States, and upon which the long and bitter controversy 
of which she had been the innocent occasion was brought 
to an end. 

In looking back over this exciting period and noting 
the results that were obtained, we cannot but be struck 
with the absurdity, inconsistency, and, in view of subse- 
quent decisions, we may add the illegality, that character- 
ized almost every phase of the proceedings of Congress 
upon this question. Thus, for instance, we find that be- 
fore admitting Missouri into the Union " upon an equal 
footing with the other States," an effort was made to de- 
prive her of the privilege which her sister States had 
exercised, and which they still possessed, of deciding for 



ADMISSION INTO THE UNION. 159 

herself whether she would or would not legalize slavery, 
unmindful apparently of the fact that if the measure had 
been carried and could have been enforced, it would have 
established her inequality at the very outset of her career. 
This was, to say the least, somewhat inconsistent ; and 
what added to the absurdity of the situation was the fact 
that, although the attempt on the part of a majority of 
the representatives from the North to prohibit slavery 
in Missouri was, as was afterwards decided, unconstitu- 
tional, yet by way of inducing them to abandon their 
opposition upon this point and consent to the admission 
of the State with or without slavery, as her people might 
decide, the South agreed to a condition, which was also 
subsequently decided to be unconstitutional, by virtue of 
which slavery was excluded from all the territory north 
of thirty-six degrees and thirty minutes north latitude. 
Thus we have the singular spectacle of a great political 
party agreeing to refrain from an act which would have 
been a violation of the organic law of the land, and which 
they therefore could not legally perform ; in return for 
which their opponents agree to a measure, and actually 
embody it into a law, which was also null and void, be- 
cause it, too, was in opposition to this same Constitu- 
tion. This, it will be observed, was compromise number 
one, the far-famed Missouri Compromise of March 6, 
1820 ; or rather it is all that was left of it after passing 
through the hands of the supreme court in 1857. In 
view of this decision it seems like waste of time to repeat 
that Missouri was not admitted into the Union under 
this agreement, but that she was brought in under an- 
other and a totally different one, entered into March 2, 
1821 ; and hence that, in the opinion of not a few, even 
of those who had aided in passing it, the first, or Mis- 



160 MISSOURI. 

souri Compromise, was violated within the year by the 
very Congress that adopted it, and the agreement as to 
the exclusion of slavery north of the line of thirty-six de- 
grees and thirty minutes thus became void and of no ef- 
fect, the consideration for it having failed. Unsatisfac- 
tory as this attempt at compromise proved to be, it did 
not by any means complete the chapter of errors and 
inconsistencies that marked the proceedings of Congress 
in all their dealings with this question. Indeed, so cu- 
rious was the next step taken that it is impossible to un- 
derstand it, save on the theory suggested by Benton, that 
the Democrats, or Republicans as they were then called, 
of the North had become sensible of the error into 
which, when judged from a party point of view, they 
had been led by keeping Missouri out of the Union, and 
were now anxious to regain their lost ground and bring 
her in, provided it could be done without jeopardizing 
their individual positions at home. Certainly nothing 
but a supposed dire political necessity could account for 
such action as that which resulted in the adoption of 
what, for the want of a better term, may be styled com- 
promise number two. By it Missouri was, as we have 
seen, admitted into the Union, but on condition that her 
legislature adopted a "solemn public act," which not 
only came in conflict with a provision of her organic law, 
and was therefore null and void, but which, if it meant 
anything and had been legal and could have been carried 
out, would have resulted in bringing her in, not on an 
equality with the other States, but shorn of the privi- 
lege which they had enjoyed, and which Illinois exer- 
cised as late as 1846, of deciding for herself as to the 
qualifications of those who were to live within her bor- 
ders, thus relegating her at once to a position of marked 
inferiority. 



ADMISSION INTO THE UNION. 161 

In other words, to protect a handful of so-called citi- 
zens in one or two of the older States, not one of whom 
would ever have thought of immigrating to Missouri, her 
legislature was required, as a condition precedent to her 
admission, to assent to a measure that was illegal in it- 
self, and could not, therefore, in any possible way affect 
the class of persons which it was ostensibly intended to 
benefit. 

When this assent was given, although the legislature 
that gave it took especial pains to declare that their 
action was of no legal force, yet the demands of Congress 
were satisfied ; and President Monroe, at the head of 
whose cabinet was that sterling patriot and statesman, 
John Quincy Adams, issued a proclamation announcing 
the fact, and declaring that the admission of Missouri 
was complete. 

Amid all this confusion and conflict of ends and 
means, laws and constitutions, and we have by no means 
exhausted the list, the resolution admitting Maine and 
the proclamation by which Missouri was brought into 
the Union are about the only measures that stand out 
distinctly and without challenge. They were final ; and 
it is probable that they would both have been passed 
without serious opposition, if Maine had been ready to 
take her place in the Union when Missouri made appli- 
cation for permission to frame her constitution. Unfor- 
tunately, this was not the case ; and it was this fact, 
which, threatening as it did to disturb the proportion 
that had hitherto existed between the free and slave 
States, gave the Federalists of the North the opportunity 
of bringing the slavery question to the front as a polit- 
ical issue. Intended, no doubt, at first, for effect in the 
local elections, it proved to be so popular, and made such 



162 MISSOURI. 

inroads into the ranks of the opposite party, that it 
speedily outgrew the narrow proportions designed for it 
and became of national importance. Instead of being 
a struggle between the Federalists, and Republicans for 
supremacy in their respective States, it brought about a 
new division of parties, by which Congress and the coun- 
try at large was divided geographically upon the line of 
slavery, with political power as the prize of the contest. 



CHAPTER IX. 

FROM 1820 TO 1844. 

Called upon to prepare a constitution in the midst 
of great political excitement, and at a time when the 
monetary affairs of the country were in a state of dis- 
organization, the people of Missouri, acting through 
their chosen delegates, set about the work with coolness 
and deliberation, and, all things considered, they framed 
an instrument that was a marvel of moderation and 
political sagacity. Among its provisions were a few, as 
for instance the one that declared ministers of the gos- 
pel ineligible to certain offices, that might have been 
improved, or better still, perhaps, left out altogether; 
but, take it all in all, it was a very creditable piece 
of work ; and if we may judge of its character from 
the length of time that it remained in force without 
any material alteration, it compared not unfavorably 
with the best similar instruments, no matter when or 
by whom they may have been " ordained and estab- 
lished." 

Especially was this true of the way in which it dealt 
with the financial question. The lesson the people of 
the State had just been taught by the failure of their 
local banks and by the evils of which this was in some 
measure the cause, severe as it was, seems to have been 
thoroughly learned, and it now brought forth good fruit. 
As a result of the experience of those years, a healthy 



164 MISSOURI. 

distrust of banks and corporations of every kind per- 
vaded all classes of the community ; and although the 
establishment in St. Louis, in 1829, of a branch of the 
United States Bank gave to the people of the State a 
currency that was safer and more convenient than any 
to which they had hitherto been accustomed, this fact 
was not sufficient to eradicate the feelings of hostility 
with which they regarded all such institutions, and which 
they imbedded in their organic law in the shape of an 
article limiting the power of the legislature to " the in- 
corporation of one bank and no more, to be in operation 
at the same time." Theoretically, and so far as legisla- 
tive action was concerned, they were a hard-money peo- 
ple, and it was not until 1837, five years after President 
Jackson's veto of the bill rechartering the United States 
Bank, that the legislature, in answer to the demands of 
the business interests of the State, availed themselves of 
the liberty allowed them, and agreed to the establishment 
of a bank. Meanwhile the notes of institutions organ- 
ized and doing business in other States formed the bulk 
of the circulating medium ; and as many of these in- 
stitutions were short-lived, their collapse entailed a loss 
that was only measured by the extent of their circulation, 
and that fell with peculiar force upon those who were 
least able to bear it. In spite, however, of the uncer- 
tainty as to the solvency of many of these banks, and the 
consequent fluctuation in the value of their notes, their 
issues, or " shin - plasters " as they were contemptuously 
called, continued to pass current until the refusal of the 
Bank of Missouri, in 1839, to receive or pay them out 
placed them at a discount so far as specie and her own 
bills were concerned. 

At first this measure created not a little indignation, 



FROM 1820 TO 1844. 165 

and the merchants of St. Louis, the chief distributive 
point of the State, denounced it in unmeasured terms, 
but the bank officials remained firm, and the course 
of events soon justified their action. By drawing a 
broad line between currency and specie or bankable 
funds, they furnished a standard, safe and steady, for 
the adjustment of values ; and this brought about a much 
needed reform, though it was powerless to drive the dis- 
credited bills out of circulation. They continued to 
pass current in small daily transactions, but when ten- 
dered in payment of large amounts they were subjected 
to the rate of discount that ruled at the time ; and those 
of us who were familiar with the business methods that 
prevailed in those days can hardly have forgotten the 
numerous Counterfeit Detectors, Bank-Note Reporters, 
and other publications of a similar character, that were 
intended to keep the merchant and trader advised of 
the condition, from week to week, of the banks whose 
notes he was called upon to handle. 

After some fifteen or twenty years of this experience, 
during which time private individuals and savings in- 
stitutions supplied, as far as could be done, the place 
of banks, the constitution of the State was amended ; 
and, in 1857, it was so changed as to authorize the es- 
tablishment of banks of issue, with branches in differ- 
ent parts of the State. With the conservatism that has 
ever been one of their marked characteristics, the peoj)le 
of Missouri did not plunge recklessly into the business 
of banking, but they very wisely limited the number of 
these parent institutions to ten, and provided that their 
aggregate capital should never exceed twenty millions 
of dollars, an outside limit that cannot be considered 
extravagant in view of the population of the State and 



166 MISSOURI. 

of the amount of business annually transacted. An ad- 
ditional safeguard was also inserted in the constitution, 
in the shape of a clause requiring these banks to be 
" based upon a specie capital ; " and in the law of 1857, 
under which they came into existence, they were still 
farther hedged in by such provisions as experience had 
seemed to render necessary. So far, then, as it could 
be done by law, every care was taken to insure the stabil- 
ity of these institutions ; and it is but just to say that 
they were founded upon a solid basis, and that with but 
few exceptions they have been well managed. 

Unfortunately, they were begun at a most inauspicious 
time. The panic of 1857, as sharp as it was short, 
found them unprepared for the demands that were 
made upon them, and a few years later, almost before 
they had recovered from its effects, they were called 
upon to share in the reverses that marked the opening 
years of the civil war. With but one exception, that of 
the Exchange Bank of St. Louis, they were obliged to 
bend before the storm ; and during the whole of that 
eventful period they had to suspend specie payments. 
The legislature, however, refused to forfeit their char- 
ters, so that with the return of peace they were able to 
resume their accustomed functions ; and to-day they are 
doing their legitimate work in facilitating the business 
of the communities in which they exist, though almost 
all of them, taking advantage of different acts of Con- 
gress, have ceased to be state institutions, and are now 
known as national banks. 

But whilst the people of the State have in the main 
shown themselves to be decidedly conservative in the 
management of their monetary affairs, public as well as 
private, there have been times when they appear to have 



FROM 1820 TO 1844. 1G7 

been unable to resist the tendency to speculation and 
overtrading which seems an inevitable attendant upon 
all new and rapidly developing communities. As a 
consequence, they have not been exempt from the pen- 
alty that attaches to such faulty methods of doing busi- 
ness, and makes itself felt in the storms which, from 
time to time, sweep over the financial world. Probably 
the severest of these storms, not so much on account of 
the amount destroyed as from the number of sufferers, 
was the one which visited the country in 1837, and 
which, following close upon the expiration of the char- 
ter of the United States Bank, is often ascribed to that 
event, though it would be going too far to assign it to 
that as the sole, or even a sufficient, cause. The truth 
is that so far from having been a prime factor in bring- 
ing on the " hard times " of 1837, the fate of the bank 
had little or nothing to do with it. This is, no doubt, 
contrary to the impression most sedulously cultivated by 
the Whigs of that day, but it can hardly be questioned 
in view of the fact that although the charter of the 
bank did not expire until 1836, yet the death-blow was 
really given to the institution in 1832, four years ear- 
lier ; and this measure, instead of causing a stringency 
in the money market and a depression in prices, as it 
would have done if there had been any necessary con- 
nection between the fate of the bank and the hard times 
of 1837, was followed, first, by a season of prosperity, 
and subsequently, as such seasons often are, by one of 
inflation, when for a time, say from 1834 to 1837, a 
fever of speculation ran riot throughout the land. Not 
only individuals, but States, caught the infection, and it 
is to the reaction following upon this condition of affairs 
that the student must look for an explanation of the 



168 MISSOURI. 

crisis which has given Van Bur en's administration such 
an undesirable prominence in the financial annals of the 
country. 

To picture the saturnalia that prevailed during these 
years of inflation were an idle task. All classes seem 
to have engaged in it, and no portion of the country was 
exempt. During its prevalence schemes without num- 
ber, some of which would have taxed the resources of the 
wealthiest communities, were launched upon the market ; 
and there were few of them that did not find earnest 
advocates. Only a fraction of the number, it is true, 
ever came to anything, but to carry them on required 
more money than was then in circulation. To supply this 
deficiency the people in some of the States, forgetful of 
the lesson of 1819, resorted to an indefinite increase of 
local, or as they were sometimes called " pet," banks. 
They seem to have imagined that these institutions, in- 
stead of being mere instruments for facilitating com- 
mercial intercourse, were, in some mysterious way, to 
create wealth. Hence in some portions of the country 
they were chartered in great numbers, without any re- 
gard to the demands of the communities in which they 
were expected to do business, and in defiance of all laws 
of finance, and occasionally, we may add, of honesty. In 
one of the Western States, an agricultural one, and 
therefore relatively independent of such facilities, there 
was at one time a bank for every five thousand inhabit- 
ants. This number is said to have been subsequently 
increased, and a writer of that day, speaking of the con- 
dition of affairs which then prevailed, says, with pardon- 
able exaggeration, " that every village plat with a house, 
or even without a house, if it had a hollow stump to 
serve as a vault, was the site of a bank ; " and " that it 



FROM 1820 TO 1844. 169 

was easy for any one to obtain their bills who could give 
reasonable assurance that he would circulate them at a 
distance and keep them afloat." 

In this way, moving steadily on, but ever in a vicious 
circle, affairs went from bad to worse, and when finally 
the crash came, Missouri, in so far as she had held a 
conservative course and kept aloof from the ruinous 
systems of internal improvement in which certain of her 
sister States had indulged, was spared some of the ca- 
lamities that they were called on to endure. Still she 
was not permitted to escape. With her growth in wealth 
and population, there had been a corresponding increase 
in commerce ; and her business interests were so closely 
united with those of other and less conservative communi- 
ties that they could not be separated. For good or evil 
they were inextricably bound together, and it was im- 
possible that one should suffer without affecting the other 
injuriously. 

Her people, too, in the management of their private 
affairs, appear to have been forgetful of the prudential 
considerations that governed their public action. For 
years they had witnessed the steady tide of immigration 
that had poured into the State, had noted the advance 
in different kinds of property, especially real estate, 
which was thus brought about ; and it was but natural, 
as this stream of settlers still rolled in unchecked, to 
look forward to a continuance of the era of prosperity 
of which it was at once the cause and a visible sign. So 
long as they saw the State gaining in all the elements 
of wealth, they did not think it possible that a condition 
of affairs could arise in which individuals composing 
that State were to suffer. In this belief they acted, and, 
heedless of the impending storm, they made every prep- 



170 MISSOURI. 

aration to share in the golden harvest which was so 
confidently anticipated. They bought and sold with a 
freedom that savored of recklessness ; engaged in enter- 
prises that under other circumstances would have been 
regarded as too rash for consideration ; and when at last 
the day of reckoning came, it found them steeped in 
debt, and with lines of credit extended far beyond the 
limits of safety. Many of them sank under the weight ; 
but the great majority, after a few years of patient 
labor and enforced economy, were able to resume their 
positions in the world of commerce. It was a season of 
trial for all, relieved somewhat by local stay laws and 
such expedients, but none the less enduring and full of 
distress. The laws of finance had been set at naught, 
and the penalty had to be paid. Slowly and after much 
suffering the process of liquidation was accomplished, 
and an era of prosperity once more dawned upon the 
stricken people ; but the record of these years, written in 
the dockets of the courts and in the long list of bank- 
ruptcies, will ever remain as a warning. 

Naturally enough, the " hard times," as this period of 
distress was called, entered largely into the political dis- 
cussions of the day, and there can be no doubt as to the 
important part it was made to play in bringing about the 
defeat of Van Buren in the presidential election of 1840. 
It had come upon the country during his administration ; 
was associated in the minds of many with the veto of the 
bank bill, which had taken place some years previously 
and whilst his political friend and predecessor was in 
power ; and although, as has been said, it owed its origin 
to causes which neither he nor his party could control, 
yet the Whigs, as the opposition was then termed, taking 
advantage of the order in which these events had oc- 



FROM 1820 TO 1844. 171 

curred, succeeded in making it appear that there was 
some necessary connection between them, and conse- 
quently that he and his political allies were responsible 
for the distress which then prevailed. It was an old 
fallacy, brought forward for the occasion, but it proved 
effective among a people whom financial troubles had 
made eager for a change ; and taken in connection with 
the military reputation which General Harrison, the op- 
posing candidate, had acquired in the war of 1812, it led 
to the political revolution that resulted in his election and 
the success of the Whigs. It was the first time in the 
century that they or the party of which they were the 
legitimate descendants had won a popular verdict at the 
polls, and however desirable this may have been for 
other reasons, its merit is somewhat obscured by the fact 
that it was due, not so much to an intelligent dissent 
from the policy of the Democrats as it was to the adroit 
use made of a condition of affairs for which the people 
at large were responsible, and to a wild and senseless, 
but shrewdly manufactured, excitement over military 
events that were of secondary importance. 

In this revolution, the people of Missouri had no part. 
They were essentially agricultural, and therefore com- 
paratively independent of banks and banking facilities. 
They were earnest believers, too, in gold and silver as 
being not only the most desirable, but in fact the only, 
kind of money that Congress could legally authorize, and 
consequently they sympathized fully with the Democrats 
in their hostility to the national bank, which they had 
come to regard as an engine of political corruption. For 
these reasons among others, they had no faith in the ex- 
planation which the Whigs were wont to give of the 
origin of the financial distress that then prevailed ; and 



172 MISSOURI. 

as they were correspondingly distrustful of the promised 
prosperity that was to follow upon a change in the ad- 
ministration at Washington, they could see no reason for 
surrendering their political convictions. Hence it was 
that in the election of 1840 they refused to " bend the 
knee to Baal," and voted with the Democrats, as they 
had done from the time that parties were organized upon 
the basis upon which they then stood, and as indeed they 
have continued to do, to this day, whenever they have 
been permitted to give a full and free expression to their 
wishes at the polls. 

Of the causes, then, that led the people of the State thus 
early to identify themselves with the Democratic party, 
hostility to the bank may be said to have been the most 
influential. At all events, the bill to recharter that in- 
stitution was the first distinctively national issue upon 
which they were called to act, and there can be no doubt 
that the position which they then assumed in favor of 
" hard money " was due in great part to the recollection 
of the bitter experience through which they had passed 
during the closing years of Missouri's career as a Terri- 
tory and the beginning of her life as a State. 

That this direction may have been given to the drift 
of opinion by the hostility which the Federalists had 
shown to the admission of the State into the Union is 
undoubtedly true ; and so far as opposition to slavery 
can be said to have been the cause of this hostility, it 
may properly be counted as a factor in the problem. 
But even if this be granted we shall have to admit that 
its influence was but short-lived ; for, owing to the neces- 
sity which then existed of providing a remedy for the 
disorder into which the business affairs of the country 
had fallen, the feeling of irritation engendered by the 



FROM 1S20 TO 1844. 173 

course of the Federalists upon this occasion disappeared 
almost as rapidly as it had sprung up. Long before the 
close of President Monroe's administration in 1824, the 
slavery question had given way to more pressing con- 
siderations, and political parties, being left free to crys- 
tallize around new centres, gradually took on the forms 
under which they fought the battle that resulted in the 
destruction of the national bank. 

But whilst it is true that, so far as the country at large 
was concerned, the slavery question had disappeared 
thus suddenly and entirely from the field of politics, it is 
a singular fact that there never was a time when, within 
the State, the sentiment of opposition to this institution 
was so active as it was during the twelve years covered by 
the administrations of the younger Adams and General 
Jackson, or when it made such headway. To a certain 
extent this was due to the movement in favor of gradual 
emancipation, of which Henry Clay was the great ex- 
ponent, and of which the Whigs, considered as a party, 
are thought to have been the peculiar advocates. In 
Kentucky, no doubt they were so, and it may also have 
been true of other portions of the South and West ; but 
in Missouri it was not the case. Here and upon this 
point both parties were in accord ; and as early as 1828 
a number of prominent men, " representing almost every 
district in the State, and consisting of about equal num- 
bers of Whigs and Democrats," agreed upon a plan by 
which they hoped to secure the passage of a law that 
would provide for gradual emancipation, and thus in time 
get rid of slavery. At a private meeting which was 
then held, they determined to urge all candidates at the 
approaching election to approve of such a measure, and 
resolutions to this effect were drawn up and secretly dis- 



174 MISSOURI. 

tributed, " with the understanding that they were to be 
placed before the people of the State in the shape of 
memorials, and both parties were to urge the people to 
sign them." Among those who took part in this meet- 
ing were United States Senators Benton and Barton, 
the former of whom was at that time, and for many- 
years after, the recognized leader of the Democrats in the 
State, whilst among the others there were those whose 
influence within their respective spheres was not less 
potent. Indeed, such was the strength of the " combina- 
tion " that the Hon. John Wilson, to whom we are in- 
debted for this curious bit of history, and who was a prom- 
inent Whig politician of that day, does not hesitate to 
declare that they had the power to carry out that pro- 
ject. Unfortunately, however, before the day arrived 
upon which the attempt was to be made, " it was pub- 
lished in the newspapers generally that Arthur Tappan, 
of New York, had entertained at his private table some 
negro men ; that, in fact, these negroes had rode in his 
private carriage with his daughters." This may or may 
not have been true, but it was generally believed in Mis- 
souri, and such was the furor it raised throughout the 
State that those who had been instrumental in getting 
up the meeting did not dare to let their memorials see 
the light. 1 

1 Mr. Wilson continues : " As well as I can call to mind, of the 
individuals who composed this secret meeting, I am the only one 
left to tell the tale ; but for that story of the conduct of the great 
original fanatic on this subject we should have carried, under the 
leadership of Barton and Benton, our project, and began in future 
the emancipation of the colored race that would long since have 
been followed by Kentucky, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, 
Tennessee, etc. Our purpose further, after we got such a law 
safely placed on the statute book, was to have followed it up by a 



FROM 1820 TO 1844. 175 

To those who are accustomed to look at the occur- 
rences of those days through the medium of subsequent 
events, it is difficult to understand how so slight a matter 
as the entertainment of a negro by a somewhat noted 
abolitionist of New York could have influenced the ac- 
tion of earnest, sensible men who were engaged, with 
good promise of success, in what they must have felt to 
be a great social reform ; but among those of us who 
can remember the tremendous influence which such tri- 
vial incidents, when skillfully handled, excited through- 
out the South, there will be no hesitation in accepting 
the fact as here given, nor will it be necessary to go 
very far to find the explanation. Color, it will be re- 
membered, was in all this region a badge of servitude, the 
one mark of inferiority that could neither be concealed 
nor gainsaid, whilst, on the other hand, every white man, 
whatsoever his condition, was in theory, at least, the 
equal socially of his neighbor. Starting from this point, 
the average Southerner, by a process of reasoning wholly 
illogical but not unnatural, had worked himself into the 
conviction that freedom to the blacks necessarily meant 
their social recognition; and when called upon for the 
proof, he referred to the Tappan dinner and similar in- 
cidents. Of course it is easy at this late day to detect 
the fallacy in this mode of reasoning, but at that time, 
and situated as he was, it was not so. From his point 
of view the argument was sound, and it was owing to 
the belief in the experimental as well as logical truth of 
the conclusion to which he had come that the movement 

provision requiring the masters of those who should he born to he 
free to teach them to read and write. This shows you how little 
a thing turns the destiny of nations." — Commonwealth of Missouri, 
p. 223. St. Louis, 1877. 



176 MISSOURI. 

in favor of gradual emancipation, which, up to this time, 
had made such notable progress among the slaveholders 
of the State, was brought to an untimely end. 

A few years after the events here narrated, Lovejoy 
took up the work and began his ill-advised agitation in 
favor of the same cause, but under very different condi- 
tions. Owing to the denunciations which the abolition- 
ists of the North were now heaping upon slavery and 
slaveholders, the Southerners not only refused to take 
any measures for ridding themselves of what a large 
number of them regarded as an evil, but they would not 
listen to arguments in favor of a policy with which, only 
a few short years before, they had been in full sym- 
pathy. Accordingly, when in 1833, on his return from 
the theological school at Princeton, Lovejoy began, in 
St. Louis, the publication of his paper, his condemnation 
of slavery and pleas for gradual emancipation fell upon 
unwilling and even hostile ears, though there was noth- 
ing new or objectionable in the doctrines he advocated ; 
and the tone and temper of his utterances, when con- 
trasted with the fierce philippics of later times, were 
as gentle as the cooings of a dove. In spite of this 
fact, they gave occasion to much ill feeling, and by way 
of allaying the excitement, and paving the way to the 
continuance of his Journal as a religious publication, 
pure and simple, a number of his friends and principal 
supporters, among whom was Hamilton R. Gamble, the 
Union Governor of Missouri during the war of seces- 
sion, advised him " to distrust his own judgment so far 
as to pass over in silence everything connected with 
slavery." This he would not agree to do, having sworn, 
as he himself tells us, " eternal enmity to slavery, and 
being determined by the blessing of God never to go 



FROM 1820 TO 1844. 177 

back." In consequence of his persistence in this objec- 
tionable course, he found, at the end of a year or two, 
that a longer residence in St. Louis was neither profit- 
able nor safe ; and in July, 1836, he so far deferred 
to public opinion that he announced his intention of 
removing to Alton, Illinois. Before he could do so, his 
office was sacked, his press and types were thrown into 
the street, but no personal injury was done him. When 
he arrived in Alton, he resumed his crusade against 
slavery, in defiance of pledges which his opponents as- 
sert he had made to the contrary, and this speedily in- 
volved him in fresh trouble. One press after another 
was destroyed, and it was while defending a third that 
he was shot, though not until he, or some of his friends, 
had fired upon and killed one of the mob. 

With the circumstances of this sad tragedy, or with 
the subsequent attempt of certain admirers to apotheo- 
size Love joy, we do not propose to concern ourselves. 
He did not meet his death in a slave State, or at the 
hands of slaveholders ; and so far as the influence 
which he is said to have exerted in bringing about the 
final settlement of this question is discernible, it would 
have been better for the cause he had so much at heart, 
and for the people whom he sought to benefit, if he had 
never been born. That he had the abstract right to 
speak and write as he did, holding himself amenable to 
the laws of his country, is true, and so, also, it is true 
that a person may have the right to go into a powder 
mill with a lighted candle ; but if any one should insist 
upon doing so, he would soon be taught that his neigh- 
bors had certain rights, not perhaps expressly guaran- 
teed by law, but which it would not be prudent to ignore. 
Thus it was with Lovejoy. Whether rightly or wrongly 



178 MISSOURI. 

it matters not, the teachings which a few years before 
had been received in Missouri with a fair share of favor 
were now considered as being not only injurious, but 
positively dangerous ; and in putting a stop to them, the 
people of St. Louis took the law into their own hands, 
but in doing so, they exercised a right or a power — it 
is immaterial by which name you call it — which is in- 
herent in all communities, and which has been uniformly 
exercised in our country whenever and wherever the 
occasion demanded. 

With the removal of Love joy from St. Louis, the 
movement in favor of gradual emancipation in Missouri 
came to an end. It was, certainly, a most dismal fail- 
ure, and yet in some respects it is one of the most in- 
teresting and instructive episodes in American history. 
Properly interpreted, it teaches us how prompt the 
Anglo-American is to resent anything that looks like 
outside dictation even from his own countrymen, and 
how futile it is to attempt to improve the domestic insti- 
tutions of our neighbors by a system of abuse, no matter 
how much it may be deserved. It also shows us that 
there was a time, and that not very long ago, when the 
people of slaveholding St. Louis and free Alton were 
equally intolerant of the anti-slavery agitation ; and if 
it does not throw any clear light upon the formation 
of political parties as they existed at the time, it fore- 
shadows, to some extent, the course of the border states 
in the war of the rebellion, and it enables us to say with 
certainty that, in the Missouri of that day, there was in 
the Democratic party a strong contingent of emancipa- 
tionists, just as there was some fifteen or twenty years 
later, when Frank Blair and Gratz Brown raised the 
banner of freedom and carried it to victory. 



FROM 1820 TO 1844. 179 

Another problem with which the Missourians of that 
day were called upon to grapple, and which, at one 
time, threatened the peace of the State, was the so- 
called Mormon war. As early as 1831, Joseph Smith, 
" the Seer, Revelator, Translator, and Prophet " of the 
new faith, visited Western Missouri, then but thinly 
populated, on a tour of inspection ; and soon afterwards 
bands of Mormons, or, as they call themselves, Latter 
Day Saints, began to arrive and settle in the neigh- 
borhood of Independence, a town situated on the south 
bank of the Missouri River near the border of the State. 
This spot, we are told, is il the place selected by God 
for the centre stake of Zion ; " and although there is 
to-day but little of that fair land of which the Saints 
can claim full and undisturbed possession, yet they still 
look forward to a return to the homes which they once 
had there, and to the time when they shall build there 
" the most magnificent temple on the face of the earth 
to the name of Jehovah." 

In the year succeeding the first settlements of the 
Mormons in this neighborhood, their numbers were 
largely increased by arrivals, chiefly from Ohio, where 
they appear to have been badly treated, Smith himself 
having been " daubed with tar and feathers " at a place 
called Hiram. They established a " mercantile house," 
as it was termed, in Independence ; opened some two 
hundred farms in the adjoining country ; planted or- 
chards, and " commenced many extensive improve- 
ments." They also issued, in June of this year, the 
first number of a periodical which was devoted, among 
other things, to "publishing the revelations of God to 
the church." These revelations must have been of a 
somewhat partial character, for they are said to have 



180 MISSOURI. 

promised most wonderful things to the faithful, whilst, 
at the same time, " they denounced equally wonderful 
things against the ungodly Gentiles." As a conse- 
quence, the Gentiles became much incensed, for in 
those days people were not as tolerant in such" matters 
as they are to-day. It may be, too, that they were an- 
gered by the interference, real or supposed, of the Mor- 
mons with their slaves ; and they certainly had very se- 
rious misgivings as to the safety of their persons and 
property whenever the Mormons should obtain the con- 
trol of the county, as they were certain to do if the rate 
at which they were then increasing should be kept up 
for any length of time. For these and other reasons 
that seemed to them good and sufficient, they determined 
to drive the new-comers from the county, and accord- 
ingly they destroyed the house in which the objection- 
able paper was printed, and pitched the press and types 
into the street. They also tarred and feathered the 
presiding bishop and one or two of the leading mem- 
bers of the church, whipped others, and burned down a 
number of their houses. These outrages brought on 
an armed collision, which seems to have resulted in 
favor of the Mormons. Their success was but tem- 
porary, for in a few days they were completely over- 
awed, and as a condition of safety they were required 
to give up their arms and leave the county within a 
specified time. This they did, some fifteen hundred 
of them, according to their own account, crossing the 
river and taking refuge in Clay and the neighboring 
counties. Here they suffered greatly, for, owing to the 
want of transportation, they had been obliged to leave 
most of their goods and chattels behind, and, conse- 
quently, they were but illy prepared to withstand the 



FROM 1820 TO 1844. 181 

winter cold that was then upon them. In the spring, 
an effort was made to bring about some arrangement by 
which they were to be paid for the property which they 
had not been able to take with them, and a committee, 
composed of some of the leading citizens of Jackson 
County, was sent over to see if it were possible to agree 
upon the basis of a settlement. The effort came to 
naught, as the demands of the Mormons were thought 
to be excessive, and equally fruitless was their appeal to 
the Executive of the State and to the courts for protec- 
tion and redress. 

At the end of three or four years, during which time 
these misguided people had been driven from Clay and 
Carroll counties, the great bulk of them, reinforced by 
large accessions from the east, had gathered together in 
Caldwell county, where they had built up a town which 
they called Far West. Speaking from a material point 
of view they were, in the main, a hard working people, 
chiefly given to agriculture, though there was no lack 
among them of skilled mechanics and shrewd merchants. 
As an evidence of the prosperity which had thus far at- 
tended their efforts, they are said to have opened in this 
and the neighboring counties two thousand farms, and 
we are also told that from the time of their arrival in 
Missouri until their expulsion, they had paid to the 
United States government, for land alone, three hundred 
and eighteen thousand dollars. At the minimum price of 
one dollar and a quarter per acre this would give them 
over two hundred and fifty thousand acres, for the most 
of which they still hold the patents. * This is certainly 
a very favorable showing, but it is only one side of the 

1 Discourse by President George A. Smith, delivered in the New 
Tabernacle, Salt Lake City, July 25, 1869. 



182 MISSOURI, 

story. On the other hand, they are represented, and no 
doubt with some degree of truth, as having been igno- 
rant, bigoted, and arrogant, easily led by the designing 
and unscrupulous men whom their very prosperity had 
attracted, and not overly observant of the rights of their 
neighbors. Preaching and believing, or affecting to be- 
lieve, that " the Lord had given the earth and the full- 
ness thereof to his people," and that they were his peo- 
ple, bands of the more lawless among them are said to 
have spent their time strolling about the country, help- 
ing themselves to whatsoever they pleased and other- 
wise spoiling the Egyptians, or in their more homely 
phrase, " milking the Gentiles." As they were largely 
in the majority, and the county officers were of their 
way of thinking on this point, they were not interfered 
with " until their lawless course excited the indignation 
of the Gentile settlers, who, not being able to obtain jus- 
tice in a lawful manner, resorted to violence and retalia- 
tion in kind, until many a dark and unlawful deed was 
perpetrated on both sides." x 

In this condition of thinly disguised hostility, matters 
remained until 1838, when the Mormons began to re- 
sist by force what they were pleased to term the attacks 
of the mob, but which, according to Gentile authority, 
were nothing more than the efforts of a sheriff's posse 
to execute the duly authorized processes of the courts. 
This of course placed the Mormons in the wrong, and 
gave Governor Boggs the opportunity, which he promptly 
seized, of calling out the militia for the purpose of put- 
ting down the insurrection and enforcing the laws. Un- 
der his proclamation a large body of troops entered 

1 Switzler, in the Commonwealth of Missouri, p. 244. St. Louis, 

1877. 



FROM 1820 TO 1844. 183 

Caldwell county, and after a skirmish at Haughn's mill, 
which seems to have been rather a butchery, the Mor- 
mons were obliged to give up their arms and agree to 
leave the State, except their leaders, who were to be 
surrendered for trial. These conditions were certainly 
very hard, but they were the best that could be obtained ; 
and if we may credit Mormon writers, it was owing to 
the determined stand of Alexander W. Doniphan that 
they were not more rigorous. As it was, the scenes that 
took place when the time came for carrying out these 
terms are said to have beggared description. The sea- 
son was already far advanced, transportation was totally 
insufficient, and yet notwithstanding these silent appeals 
for delay some thousands 1 of these unfortunate creatures 
of all ages, sizes, conditions, and of both sexes were 
driven from their homes, and compelled to cross almost 
the entire northern part of the State before they could 
hope to find a resting place. As a rule, they were poor, 
had nothing but the small farms from which they were 
driven, but such was the pressure put upon them, or 
their anxiety to get away, that not infrequently " a val- 
uable farm was traded for an old wagon, a horse, a 
yoke of oxen, or anything that would furnish them with 
the means of leaving." To take advantage of the ne- 
cessities of a people so situated, even when their misfor- 
tunes were brought about by their own misdeeds, was 
certainly bad enough ; but what adds immeasurably to 
the shame of the transaction is the fact that there are 

1 In the Succinct History the numher of refugees is given 
at fifteen thousand ; Switzler, on the other hand, p. 249, tells us 
that "at this time there were ahout 5,000 inhabitants in Caldwell 
county, nearly 4,000 being Mormons, most of whom went to Nau- 
voo, Illinois." 



184 MISSOURI. 

grounds for believing that not a little of the intolerance 
shown on this occasion may have been due to a desire 
on the part of the Gentiles to get possession of the Mor- 
mons' land. At least, this is the not unnatural inference 
from the statement made, not by one of themselves, but 
by a gentleman who has enjoyed exceptional advantages 
for acquainting himself with the facts of the case, and 
who tells us that " in many instances conveyances of 
land were demanded and enforced at the mouth of a 
pistol or rifle." * 

With the leaders who were held for trial nothing was 
ever done, though they were indicted for treason, mur- 
der, robbery, arson, resisting legal process, and almost 
all the other crimes known to the calendar. In remov- 
ing them to Boone, to which county they had obtained 
a change of venue, Joseph Smith escaped, by bribing 
the guards say the Gentiles, or, possibly, as the Mor- 
mons assert, by the connivance of the state authorities. 
One or two of the others were brought to trial, and after 
an impartial hearing, in which they were defended by 
General Doniphan, and James S. Rollins of Boone, they 
were acquitted. In view of this decision, the prosecut- 
ing attorney for that district wisely determined to dis- 
miss the indictments against the others, and at the Au- 
gust term of the court, 1840, they were discharged from 
custody. 

Immediately on their release they repaired to Hancock 
County, Illinois, where the other refugees from Missouri 

1 Switzler, in the Commonwealth of Missouri, p. 249. In the 
Succinct History we are told that " Several hundred persons were 
driven in a defenseless condition into a hollow square of armed 
fiends, and compelled to sign away their property to the repub- 
lic of Missouri, to defray the expenses which had been incurred 
in committing these crimes." 



FROM 1820 TO 1844. 185 

had already established themselves. Here they were 
most hospitably received as their co-religionists had al- 
ready been, for the Saints were looked upon as martyrs 
to their faith, and their sufferings had excited the sym- 
pathy of all, even of those who knew how incompatible 
were their social, political, and religious ideas and cus- 
toms with the peace and welfare of the community in 
which they dwelt ; but even here their stay was short. 
In June, 1844, less than four years after their expul- 
sion from Missouri, Joseph Smith and Hyrum, his 
brother, prisoners in the hands of the law at Warsaw, 
Illinois, were shot down by a mob ; and in 1846, the 
last of the Mormons were finally driven from Illinois, 
under circumstances that entailed heavier sacrifices and 
more suffering than had attended their enforced flight 
from Missouri. 

Other measures there were of more or less importance 
which called for settlement during this most eventful 
period, and were, happily, free from the element of vio- 
lence that characterized the treatment of Lovejoy and 
the Mormons. Prominent among them were the es- 
tablishment of the State University, at Columbia, and 
the addition to the State of the triangle situated north 
of the Missouri, between that river and a continuation 
of the southern half of the western boundary line to the 
northern limits of the State. This region is popularly 
known as the Platte Purchase. It contains an area 
about, equal in extent to that of Delaware, is of excep- 
tional fertility, and has since been divided into six coun- 
ties, one of which, Buchanan, is among the wealthiest 
and most populous in the State. In 1832, when the 
legislature first took definite action for the acquisition 
of this region, it belonged to the Sacs and Foxes, to 



186 MISSOURI. 

whom it had been granted in exchange for their posses- 
sions further to the eastward ; and hence before the pro- 
posed measure could be carried out, it became necessary 
to abrogate the treaty with those tribes, — no very diffi- 
cult matter so far as they were concerned and as such 
affairs were usually managed. But besides this ob- 
stacle it involved a violation of the Missouri Compro- 
mise, as the whole of the coveted territory lay to the 
north of the line of thirty-six degrees and thirty min- 
utes ; and this, it would seem, ought to have been a more 
serious consideration. Fortunately just at this time and 
for a satisfactory reason, it was not as important for 
the North to insist upon the sacredness of that com- 
pact as it afterwards became ; and consequently in 1836 
a bill making this addition to the State was passed 
through Congress without causing so much as a ripple 
of excitement. Under its terms a treaty was made with 
these Indians by which all this tract was relinquished to 
the whites, and in 1837 it was formally annexed to the 
State. In speaking of the legislation by which this was 
brought about, Colonel Benton ignored his own services, 
and in his large-hearted way was in the habit of giving 
all the credit of the measure to his colleague, Senator 
Lewis F. Linn. He also bore willing testimony to the 
generosity and magnanimity of the Northern Congress- 
men, without whose aid it could not have become a law. 
To this award we do not object, though, possibly, our 
admiration of the liberality of the Northern members 
may be tempered by the reflection that, politically speak- 
ing, this concession to what is sometimes styled " the 
slave power " cost them nothing. It did not and could 
not add to the voting strength of the South in the Sen- 
ate, the only place where the numerical superiority of 



FROM 1820 TO 1844. 187 

the North was in the least danger ; and it is probably 
safe to say that the representatives from that section, 
in permitting the bill to pass, were influenced by this 
consideration quite as much as they were by feelings of 
generosity, or by the personal popularity of Dr. Linn, 
great as that deservedly was. To have acted otherwise 
would have been, on their part, a useless and aggravat- 
ing exhibition of strength on a point which, practically, 
could neither injure them nor benefit their opponents ; 
and as such a display was not called for, either as a mat- 
ter of principle or policy, they wisely kept out of a con- 
test in which they had nothing to gain. Had the cir- 
cumstances been changed and the stake been worth fight- 
ing for, the result would perhaps have been different ; 
for whatever may have been the shortcomings of the 
Northern members of Congress in other respects, they 
were never in the habit of wasting their strength upon 
idle issues, nor did they fall into the error of mistaking 
the shadow for the substance when a question arose in- 
volving the possession of political power. 

Turning now from individual business troubles and 
matters of purely local concern to subjects of national 
interest, the people of Missouri and of the country at 
large found abundant occupation during the next few 
years in dealing with questions that were connected, 
directly or indirectly, with the hard times of 1837. 
The presidential election of 1840, as we have seen, 
turned largely upon this issue ; and though the Whigs 
were successful in the contest, yet, owing to the death of 
their candidate in one short month after his inauguration, 
and to the treachery, as they termed it, of Vice-Presi- 
dent Tyler, who succeeded him, they failed to reap the 
reward of their hard-earned victory. Indeed, if we ex- 



188 MISSOURI. 

cept the protective tariff of 1842, of which he approved, 
Mr. Tyler, in his administration of affairs, may be said 
to have followed the policy outlined by his Democratic 
predecessor. Not only was this true of the financial 
legislation of this period, but it also held good in rela- 
tion to the management of foreign affairs, and espe- 
cially in regard to the annexation of Texas — the one 
measure that has given to this otherwise uneventful 
administration a right to the memorable place in Amer- 
ican history which it unquestionably holds. 



CHAPTER X. 

THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS AND THE CONQUEST 
OF NEW MEXICO. 

In the question of the annexation of Texas, the peo- 
ple of Missouri were deeply interested; and as it was 
the immediate cause of the war with Mexico, in which 
they played a most important part, it may not be out of 
place to take a rapid glance at some of the causes that 
brought it about. And first of all it must be premised 
that it was not a new measure broached now for the 
first time and as the result of a deep laid conspiracy for 
the increase of slave territory, but on the contrary, it 
was the outcome of forces which were perfectly natural, 
which are constantly at work among all strong, coloniz- 
ing nations, and which were shared to a very great ex- 
tent by the people of the whole country, North as well 
as South. For twenty years, in fact ever since John 
Quincy Adams, acting under the instructions of Presi- 
dent Monroe, but in opposition to his own better judg- 
ment, had concluded the treaty by which all the vast 
tract of country, now known as Texas, was handed over 
to Spain in exchange for the Floridas, the policy of 
the United States, it mattered not which political party 
happened to be in the ascendant, had been to recover 
it, whenever it could be done on satisfactory terms. To 
this end, Adams, on more than one occasion during the 
four years that he was at the head of affairs, endeavored 



190 MISSOURI. 

to buy it back, either in whole or in part ; and later, 
Jackson and Van Buren both made ineffectual efforts in 
the same direction. Nothing daunted by these repeated 
failures, Tyler took up the good work ; and it was in 
1844, during the closing year of his administration, that 
a treaty of annexation was made with Texas, the rejec- 
tion of which by the United States Senate led to the 
adoption of a joint resolution by Congress for the ad- 
mission of that State into the Union and thus paved the 
way to the Mexican war. 

During all these years, affairs in the Spanish Ameri- 
can provinces had not been at a standstill. In 1824, 
Mexico revolted from Spain, and in 1836, Texas, follow- 
ing the example thus set her, declared herself indepen- 
dent of Mexico. Of the causes that prompted her to 
this course it is not my place to speak. All that it con- 
cerns us to know is that on the bloody field of San 
Jacinto she showed, beyond the possibility of a doubt, 
that she was abundantly able to maintain her position, 
and that in consequence of the signal victory which 
she gained on this occasion her independence was recog- 
nized by the United States. This action, it is true, has 
been criticised as being premature, and wanting in 
comity to a sister republic, but it was in accordance with 
the traditional policy of the government ; and its pro- 
priety can hardly be questioned in view of the fact that 
England and France made haste to do the same thing, 
and that Mexico was never in a position to reassert her 
authority over any portion of the revolted province by 
force of arms — the only way in which such an asser- 
tion could have been made effectual. 

Being thus left to herself, with her independence 
acknowledged by three of the leading powers of the 



THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 191 

world, and with no enemy strong enough to dispute her 
right to self-government, it was certainly competent for 
Texas to enter into any engagements that she might 
think conducive to her future welfare, and with any 
power with which she might see fit to treat. It was 
a matter in which she possessed freedom of action by 
virtue of her position as a sovereign State ; and as the 
United States had recognized her right to this position 
when they acknowledged her independence in 1837, it 
followed necessarily that there was no valid reason, 
either in law or morals, why they should not become a 
party to any such treaty, provided they chose to do so. 
Accordingly, when, in 1844, the treaty of annexation 
came before the Senate of the United States for ratifi- 
cation, the question to be decided was not one of inter- 
national morality, for that had been settled some seven 
years before, but of expediency, and of this they were 
the sole judges. In other words, they were called upon 
to say whether the acquisition of the magnificent empire 
which they were then offered was worth the war which 
Mexico had foolishly threatened 1 in the event of its 
acceptance, and the internal struggle and consequent 
strain upon the Union which the acquisition of addi- 
tional slave territory would inevitably cause. Other 
objections there may have been, of more or less weight, 
but these were the chief, and it may be added that they 
were decisive, for in April of this year the treaty was 

1 On the 3d of November, 1843, General Almonte, the Mexican 
minister in Washing-ton, notified the state department that if the 
United States should commit the " inaudito atentado " of ap- 
propriating- to themselves an integral portion of the Mexican 
territory, he would demand his passports, and his country would 
declare war. Bancroft, History of the Pacific States,\ol. viii. p. 
335. San Francisco, 1885. 



192 MISSOURI. 

rejected by a vote of 35 to 16, a number of those who 
were in favor of annexation voting against the treaty 
on account of certain objectionable features which it 
contained. 

This action of the Senate, while it effectually dis- 
posed of this particular measure, was so far from 
putting a stop to the agitation for the acquisition of 
Texas that it merely transferred it to another and a 
larger field. It now became the principal issue in the 
presidential election that came off a few months later ; 
and it was, no doubt, the position of seeming hostility 
to this measure which Clay, as leader of the Whigs, was 
made to assume that led to his defeat and the suc- 
cess of the Democrats. Instead of coming out openly 
in favor of the acquisition of this region, as from his 
course in 1819, and again in 1837, it was to have been 
expected that he would do, he seems to have been 
driven by the logic of events into a position in which it 
became necessary to sacrifice something of his freedom 
of opinion to the necessities of his party, and to what 
he certainly believed to be the good of the country at 
large. Thus, for example, when questioned as to his 
views upon this subject, he answered that, " so far from 
having any personal objection to the annexation of 
Texas, he would be glad to see it, without dishonor, 
without war, with the common consent of the Union, 
and upon just and fair terms." He also added that he 
did not think that " the subject of slavery ought to af- 
fect the question one way or the other." That he was 
sincere in returning this Delphic answer, and that his 
course was dictated by praiseworthy motives, do not 
admit of a doubt. As an abstract proposition he would 
unquestionably have been in favor of annexation, as 



THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 193 

would nine tenths of the people of his State and of the 
South and West ; but during his entire career, devotion 
to the Union had been his controlling principle of action, 
and so great was his dread of the consequences that 
would follow the acquisition of additional slave terri- 
tory that he was betrayed into a position which com- 
mitted him to nothing definite, and which, perhaps for 
this very reason, weakened him in the South and West, 
whilst it failed to strengthen him in the North. Polk, on 
the other hand, the Democratic candidate, was pledged 
to immediate annexation, and his friends were united 
and aggressive. They knew what they wanted, and as 
there were no considerations of party policy to qualify 
their action, they were at liberty to work for it deter- 
minedly and with enthusiasm. In the end they were 
successful, as they deserved to be, whether the cause for 
which they contended be judged upon its merits, or 
whether we simply take into consideration the frankness 
with which they avowed their purpose and the energy 
with which they carried on the contest. 

In this election the people of Missouri, by a very 
decided majority, recorded their votes in favor of the 
policy of annexation and against the great Kentuckian, 
though, in 1824, they had given the electoral vote of 
the State first to him, and then to the younger Adams, 
whose election was thus secured. In pursuing this 
course they were actuated by the sentiment of national 
pride which finds its expression in the spread of Amer- 
ican ideas and institutions, and they were also largely 
influenced by that faith in themselves and in the future 
"of their country which led them to look upon it as the 
" manifest destiny " of every contiguous bit of territory 
to gravitate, sooner or later, into the Union. These sen- 



194 MISSOURI. 

timents were more or less general, and though by a sort 
of poetic license they are sometimes said to have been 
due to the Viking blood that is supposed to course 
through the veins of every Anglo-American, yet, in real- 
ity, under the less attractive name of a passion for terri- 
torial aggrandizement, they are common to every grow- 
ing power, to whatever race it may belong. They are 
also sufficient, when taken in connection with the sym- 
pathy that was felt for the cause of Texas and the 
horror inspired by the massacres of defenseless prison- 
ers at Goliad and the Alamo, to account for the move- 
ment on the part of the people of the Southwest to throw 
a protecting shield over their weaker neighbor, without 
attributing their conduct to any such recondite motive 
as a desire to increase the voting strength of their sec- 
tion by the acquisition of territory which might be ulti- 
mately cut up into slave States. This is, no doubt, con- 
trary to the impression that has been assiduously propa- 
gated, and possibly, in regard to a few extremists from 
the far South, the statement may not hold good, but with 
these exceptions it is believed to be substantially true. 
Certainly, so far as the people of Missouri were con- 
cerned, the extension of the slave area was so little 
thought of at this time that but for the prominence 
given to it by the opponents of annexation, it would not 
have entered into their calculations. Upon this point 
there is not room for an argument. The recollection of 
the fierce struggle that had attended the admission of 
Missouri into the Union, not less than the necessities of 
her position on the border line between freedom and 
slavery, had inspired her people with a healthy spirit of 
conservatism ; and although they had very decided ideas 
as to the propriety and expediency of " recovering " 



THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 195 

Texas, yet they were not prepared to do so in the inter- 
est or at the behest of the so-called slave power, if by 
so doing they were to endanger the stability of the 
Union. This position they made manifest in a series of 
resolutions, which was adopted by the legislature for the 
guidance of their members of Congress, and which was 
laid before the Senate at Washington, in February, 1845. 
In it, they express the opinion that the decision of the 
question as to the existence of slavery " ought to be left 
to the people who now, or may hereafter, occupy the 
territory that may be annexed ;" but at the same time 
they declare that " so essential do they regard the an- 
nexation of Texas to the interests of the State and of 
the United States that, rather than fail in the consum- 
mation of this object, they will consent to such just and 
reasonable compromises ... as may be indispensably 
necessary to secure the accomplishment of the measure 
and preserve the peace and harmony of the Union." 
In sentiments like these all true patriots can unite, and 
it would have been well for the peace of the country if 
they had been more general. They indicate a proper 
appreciation of the principle of concession which is 
necessary to the success of representative government, 
and they breathe a spirit of moderation and loyalty that 
is in refreshing contrast to the threats of disunion in 
which at this time, Massachusetts, not less than South 
Carolina, so freely indulged, provided their respective 
ideas were not carried out. 

But besides the desire for territorial increase and the 
interest which they, not unnaturally, felt in the effort 
of their neighbors to maintain their independence, the 
people of Missouri were closely connected with those of 
Texas by ties of blood ; and it was the fact of this kin- 



196 MISSOURI. 

ship, the actual personal interest which it gave them 
in the individual well-being of their friends and relatives 
over the border, that largely influenced their action at 
this time, just as during the earlier years of the struggle 
with Mexico it had led them to make the cause of Texas 
their own. To understand how this close relationship 
had grown up, it is necessary to bear in mind that soon 
after the treaty which gave Spain the undisputed posses- 
sion of all this region, emigration began to flow into it 
from Missouri. The stream was never, perhaps, very 
strong, at least not when compared with the current of 
population that poured into the older State, but it was 
steady, and for twenty years or more it rolled in without 
let or hindrance. At first, these emigrants were drawn 
thither by the boundless " range " which the plains of 
Texas promised ; and it may well be that not a few of 
them, as for instance the Austins, Browns, and others, 
were attracted by the stories with which they must have 
been familiar of " the happy days " when, under Spanish 
rule, land could be had for the asking and taxes were un- 
known. At all events, similar inducements had brought 
their fathers across the Mississippi into what was then 
Spanish Louisiana ; and as they are quite sufficient to 
account for the desire which, we are told, 1 prevailed 
among the Missourians of that day to emigrate to Texas, 
it will not be necessary to seek further for the explana- 
tion of a movement which any one familiar with border 
life will recognize as being perfectly natural. 

1 " It is curious to observe with how much ardor they recur to 
the recollection of those happy days. And these recollections are 
the cause that those people and their descendants have still a 
strong 1 predilection for the French and Spanish governments, and 
one great reason of their wish to emigrate to Texas." — Flint's 
Travels, p. 209. Boston, 1826. 



THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 197 

Some ten or fifteen years later, after the Texan struggle 
for independence had been begun and when it became 
evident that Mexico intended, if possible, to crush the 
movement by force of arms, a new and important ele- 
ment was introduced into the contest. The sympathy 
which the people of Missouri and the Southwest felt 
for their friends and relatives in Texas, and which had 
hitherto been theoretical rather than personal, now lost 
its passive character and became at once an active mov- 
ing force. They could not look upon the people of Texas 
as strangers and foreigners, and it was impossible to sit 
quietly by and see them engaged in what appeared to be 
a hopeless struggle with a people of alien race. Accord- 
ingly when, in her hour of need, a cry went up from 
Texas for aid, it met with a quick and effectual response. 
" Blood " proved to be " thicker than water," and the 
recognition of this fact led, as it must always do with a 
people in whom the race feeling is as strong as it is 
among the Anglo-Americans, to results that can hardly 
be justified under the law of nations. International 
boundaries were overstepped as if they had been obso- 
lete lines ; neutrality proclamations and hostile mani- 
festoes were treated as so much waste paper, and, in 
short, the emigrant now moved with a musket in his 
hands instead of a plough. In company with their 
neighbors the people of Missouri had taken the matter 
into their own hands, and as individuals they did not 
hesitate to do that which was interdicted to them as a 
State, and from which in their national capacity they 
would probably have shrunk. Of the number of them 
that flocked into Texas during her colonial days and in 
the anxious years that preceded and followed her dec- 
laration of independence, it is impossible to form any- 



198 MISSOURI. 

thing like a correct idea, but it is probably within bounds 
to assert that between 1822 and 1836 there were few 
prominent Missouri families that were not at some time 
represented in the life of the new State. 

Such being the feeling in Missouri when the question 
of the annexation of Texas became a living issue, the 
result could not long be doubtful. Annexation was 
carried by a majority of ten thousand against the strong- 
est candidate the Whigs could put up, and it would have 
been larger, had it not been for the well-settled belief 
that Clay was at heart as much in favor of the measure 
as was his Democratic opponent, and that really the only 
difference between them on this point was in the way in 
which they expected and desired to see it accomplished. 
That this belief was not without a solid foundation was 
shown by the action of Congress, which met in December, 
1844, hard on the heels of the presidential election. It 
was the same body that had rejected the treaty of an- 
nexation, and yet, at this session, they passed a joint 
resolution which accomplished the same purpose in a far 
more summary manner. On the 4th of July, 1845, Texas 
acceded to the terms offered her, and in the December 
following she was formally admitted into the Union by 
an overwhelming vote, over two thirds of the members 
of each house being in favor of the measure. 

A few days after the adoption of the joint resolution, 
in March, 1845, General Almonte, the Mexican minister 
at Washington, closed his legation, as he had said he 
would do, and in due time the American representative 
at the city of Mexico received his passports. This was 
certainly ominous, but President Polk, who was now in 
power, unwilling to abandon all hopes of peace, proposed 
through the American consul to send an envoy to Mexico, 



THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 199 

clothed with powers to settle all the questions that were 
in dispute between the two countries. This proposi- 
tion was at first favorably received, and John Slidell 
was sent out on that errand. He arrived at Vera 
Cruz in the following December, only to find that the 
policy of the Mexican authorities had undergone a 
change. They now refused to receive him, and in so 
doing they effectually shut the door upon all prospects of 
peace. Soon after, on the 24th of April, 1846, General 
Arista, the Mexican commander on the Texas border, 
notified General Taylor that he considered hostilities to 
have begun, and the next day the collision took place 
which gave occasion to the declaration on the part of 
Congress that " war existed by the act of Mexico." 

Whether this war could have been averted by the 
adoption of some less summary method of annexation 
is a matter that may well be doubted. On more than 
one occasion Mexico had officially declared that the in- 
corporation of Texas into the United States would be 
regarded as a cause of war, and there is no reason for 
supposing that she did not intend to abide by her dec- 
laration. At all events this is precisely what she did ; 
and, whatever may have been the provocation, it is clear 
that in the attack which her troops made upon Captain 
Thornton's small command near the town of Matamoras, 
but on the east side of the Rio Grande and therefore 
within the limits claimed by Texas, she committed the 
first overt act of the war. 

When the news of this skirmish reached New Orleans, 
General E. P. Gaines, a veteran of the war of 1812, who 
was in command of that military department, became 
alarmed for the safety of General Taylor's army and 
made a requisition upon several of the neighboring States 



200 MISSOURI. 

for volunteers, in addition to the four regiments asked 
for by Taylor himself from Texas and Louisiana respec- 
tively. Missouri was one of the States thus called upon, 
and so prompt was her response that, in two weeks from 
the receipt of the governor's order in St. Louis, a regi- 
ment six hundred and fifty strong was on its way to the 
seat of war. They did not remain long in the field, nor 
did they see any actual service ; for General Gaines' 
course was disavowed at Washington, and as the troops 
raised under his call, owing to the short time for which 
they were enlisted, were an embarrassment rather than 
an assistance, they were disbanded and sent home at 
the end of three months. 

With the return of this regiment and its discharge 
from the service, Missouri's part in the military opera- 
tions along this portion of the frontier was brought to a 
close. Her troops were needed in another field, and to 
this end they were ordered to rendezvous at Fort Leaven- 
worth, a government post on the western border of the 
State, where a force was being assembled preparatory to 
a march on New Mexico and California. This little 
band, known by the pretentious name of the " Army of 
the West," consisted of one regiment of horse, one bat- 
talion of infantry and one of artillery, all volunteers, 
with six companies — about three hundred — of the first 
(regular) dragoons, the whole amounting to some sixteen 
hundred and fifty men. With the exception of the reg- 
ulars all of these troops were from Missouri, their com- 
mander, Colonel, afterwards General Kearney, himself, 
being a citizen of the State. In the latter part of June, 
1846, they set out from Fort Leavenworth, and taking the 
well known " Santa F6 trail " they reached that town on 
the 18th of August, having made the journey of nine 



CONQUEST OF NEW MEXICO. 201 

hundred miles through an uninhabited region in less than 
fifty days, and with but little loss in men or animals, 
though there were times when they suffered for want of 
water and from a scarcity of provisions. Upon their 
approach Governor Armijo abandoned the place and re- 
treated southwards, — the result, it is said, of an intrigue 
in which he and Don Diego Archuleta, his second in com- 
mand, were bribed, — so that when the Americans ar- 
rived before the town they had nothing to do but to 
enter and take possession. This they did, " without fir- 
ing a gun or shedding a drop of blood." 

Compared with the storming . of Monterey or the cap- 
ture of the city of Mexico, the unresisted occupation of 
this village can hardly be called a brilliant achievement ; 
and yet in the end it led to results that have proved to 
be quite as momentous, and far more permanent, than 
any that followed those successes, signal as they were. 
At that date Santa Fe proper contained a population of 
about three thousand souls, who lived in badly furnished 
houses, built of adobe, in the usual New Mexican fashion, 
and only one story high. Poor and mean as the village 
was, it had a certain importance, growing out of the cir- 
cumstance that for twenty years or more it had been 
the entrepot of the overland trade with Missouri, and a 
sort of distributing point for all the goods imported into 
this and the neighboring departments of northern 
Mexico. From a small beginning in 1822 this trade 
had gone on, increasing year by year, until in 1843 it 
was estimated at four hundred and fifty thousand dol- 
lars, necessitating the employment of two hundred and 
thirty wagons and three hundred and fifty men. Even 
in 1845, after the adoption of the joint resolution for 
the annexation of Texas, and when the relations between 



202 MISSOURI. 

the United States and Mexico were consequently in a 
high state of tension, the value of the goods brought 
into Santa Fe over this route is said to have been about 
three hundred and fifty thousand dollars ; and it is a 
curious fact, indicative perhaps of the sentiments with 
which the merchants, native as well as foreign, regarded 
the occupation of this department, that there was at 
this time a large caravan of traders' wagons, following 
in the wake of the American troops. 

Aside from the importance which this place possessed 
as a port of entry, it was the political capital of the 
department, which is divided into two parts by the Rio 
Grande. It was also situated some miles to the eastward 
of this stream and therefore within the limits claimed by 
Texas, though in justice it must be admitted that she 
had never been able to extend her sway thus far, the 
effort which she made in 1841 to do so having resulted 
in a disastrous failure. 

On the day after he took possession of Santa Fe, 
General Kearney issued a proclamation, in which, among 
other things, he absolved the people of New Mexico from 
all allegiance to their constituted authorities, and by a 
stroke of the pen transformed them into citizens of the 
United States. This was certainly a very high-handed 
measure ; but it were easily defended, if, as was the case 
with the proclamation issued August 2d from Bent's 
Fort, its effect had been limited to so much of the de- 
partment as was situated east of the Del Norte, as the 
Rio Grande is here called, though the ultimate own- 
ership of the tract would have depended upon the fate 
of the war. General Kearney, however, was not dis- 
posed to wait upon the slow march of military events, 
nor did he have the slightest intention of abandoning 



CONQUEST OF NEW MEXICO. 203 

one foot of the territory upon which he had seized. So 
far was he from it that on the 22d of August, only 
three days after the officials at Santa Fe had been 
required to take the oath of allegiance to the United 
States, he announced his purpose of holding the en- 
tire department " with its original boundaries (on both 
sides of the Del Norte) ; " and as if to to leave no doubt 
as to his intentions, he caused a constitution and code 
of laws to be prepared which changed New Mexico, in 
name and in fact, from a province of Mexico into a 
territory of the United States. 

In seeking for the authority under which Kearney 
acted in making these radical changes, we are obliged 
to fall back upon the confidential instructions sent him 
June 3, 1846, though, carefully worded and elastic as 
they are, they can hardly be said to justify his course. 
Unquestionably, they authorize him to take possession 
of New Mexico and " establish a temporary civil govern- 
ment therein ; " and there can be no doubt that they 
also require him to assure the people of this province 
that "it is the wish and design of the United States to 
provide for them a free government . . . similar to that 
which exists in our territories ; " but beyond this they 
do not go. Nowhere, not even by implication, do they 
confer upon him the power to annex this or any other 
region that he might conquer. Indeed, it could not well 
have been otherwise, for this was a power which the 
President himself did not possess, and which, conse- 
quently, he could not delegate to another. But whilst 
this is clear, it is difficult to believe that Kearney, sol- 
dier that he was and therefore accustomed to obey or- 
ders, would, in a matter of this importance, have taken 
the responsibility of acting as he did, unless he had been 



204 MISSOURI. 

assured of sympathy and support from Washington. Of 
course, this is conjecture and must be taken for what it 
is worth, though it is but fair to add that it receives a 
certain amount of confirmation from the fact that Pres- 
ident Polk, when communicating the account of these 
proceedings to Congress, refers to what, he says, may 
have been "the exercise of an excess of power," and ex- 
cuses it on the ground that it was " the offspring of a 
patriotic desire to give to the inhabitants the privileges 
and immunities so cherished by the people of our own 
country." 

However, let the responsibility for this wholesale seiz- 
ure of foreign territory be where it may, it is very evi- 
dent that Kearney was never troubled by any doubts as 
to what was required of him. On the contrary, he always 
moved resolutely, without hesitation, and as if sure of his 
ground. When the constitution and laws, the prepa- 
ration of which had been committed to Colonel Doni- 
phan and Private W. P. Hall, of the Missouri volunteers, 
were submitted to him, he at once ordered them to be 
promulgated and obeyed ; and on the very same day he 
completed the civil organization of the territory by the 
appointment of another Missourian, Charles Bent, of 
Bent's Fort, as governor, with a full complement of 
judges and other officials, among whom we recognize 
the well-known name of Francis P. Blair, Jr., as attorney 
general. Having thus set the wheels of government in 
motion, he felt that his work in New Mexico was done, 
and on the 25th of September, but little more than a 
month from the date of his arrival at Santa Fe, he set 
out for California. 

On the 26th, the day after his departure, Colonel 
Sterling Price, of the 2d Missouri mounted volunteers, 



CONQUEST OF NEW MEXICO. 205 

arrived in Santa Fe and relieved Colonel Doniphan, 
who began to prepare for his march on Chihuahua, 
where it was supposed he would find General Wool, to 
whom he had been ordered to report. Before he was 
ready to move, the Navajo Indians had become so 
troublesome that an order was sent back by General 
Kearney, directing him to march against them and put 
a stop to their depredations. Dividing his command, 
he sent a column under Major Gilpin up the Chama 
and across the mountains into the valley of the little 
Colorado ; with another he inarched up the valley of 
the Puerco ; while a third party, numbering only thirty 
men, under command of Captain John W. Reid, took a 
middle route and thus penetrated into the very heart of 
the Indian country. By means of these several expedi- 
tions all the different bands of the Navajos were visited, 
and it resulted in bringing a large number of their chiefs 
and warriors to the Ojo del Oso, — Bear Spring, — a well- 
known watering-place sixty miles northwest of Zuni 
and not far from the Moqui villages. Here the coun- 
cil was held and peace was finally concluded, though 
Colonel Doniphan seems to have had some difficulty in 
making the Navajos understand how it was that he now 
appeared as the defender of the people whom he had 
come out to fight. Thus, when the Navajos were told 
that they would no longer be permitted to continue their 
hostile incursions into the territory, one of their chiefs 
is said to have answered : " Americans, you have a 
strange cause of war against the Navajos. We have 
waged war against the New Mexicans for several years. 
We have plundered their villages, and killed many of 
their people, and made many prisoners. We had just 
cause for all this. You have lately commenced a war 



206 MISSOURI. 

against the same people. You are powerful. You have 
great guns and many brave soldiers. You have there- 
fore conquered them, the very thing we have been at- 
tempting to do for so many years. You now turn upon 
us for attempting to do what you have done yourselves. 
We cannot see why you have cause of quarrel with us 
for fighting the New Mexicans on the west, while you 
do the same thing on the east. Look how matters stand. 
This is our war. We have more right to complain of 
you for interfering in our war, than you have to quarrel 
with us for continuing a war we had begun long before 
you got here. If you will act justly, you will allow us 
to settle our own differences." 

In reply to this statement, which is not without its 
force, Colonel Doniphan explained that the " New 
Mexicans had surrendered ; that the whole country and 
everything in it had become ours ; that when the In- 
dians now stole property from the New Mexicans they 
were stealing from us ; and that when they killed them 
they were killing our people, and that this could not be 
suffered any longer." Satisfied with this explanation, 
or, as is far more probable, intimidated by the display 
of force and the energy with which the Americans had 
followed them over snow -covered regions into their 
mountain fastnesses, the Navajos agreed to a treaty of 
peace, which, by a special article, was made to include 
the New Mexicans and also the Pueblo Indians. 

Having arranged this matter satisfactorily, Colonel 
Doniphan was now at liberty to take up his line of 
march for Chihuahua, and, accordingly, he retraced his 
steps to the valley of the Del Norte, where he established 
his headquarters at the town of Valverde, which had been 
made the depot for his supplies and the rendezvous for 



CONQUEST OF NEW MEXICO. 207 

the different detachments of his regiment. Here the 
weary soldiers were allowed a few days of rest, before 
they were called upon to start on that long and toilsome 
march which, beginning with Chihuahua as the objective 
point, only ended on the shores of the Mexican gulf. 
On the 14th of December, all things being in readiness, 
the first battalion, consisting of three hundred men under 
Major Gilpin, set out, the regiment moving in separate 
divisions for the convenience of crossing the Jornada del 
muerto, a sandy waste of ninety miles, without wood or 
water. On the 16th Lieutenant Colonel Jackson fol- 
lowed with two hundred men, and on the 19th Doniphan 
brought up the rear with the rest of the regiment, the 
principal part of the baggage train, and Lieutenant Colo- 
nel Mitchell and ninety men of the 2d Missouri — Price's 
regiment. A hard march of three days brought them 
across the desert, and on the 22d the command was con- 
centrated at the little village of Donna Ana, where they 
found an abundance of supplies of all kinds, with streams 
of running water. Continuing their journey down the 
valley, they came, on the afternoon of the 25th, — Christ- 
mas Day, — to a place called Bracito (" little arm " of 
the river), where they pitched their camp and began to 
make themselves comfortable for the night. Whilst they 
were scattered about, engaged in gathering forage for 
their horses, and fuel and water for their own needs, they 
were attacked by a superior force of Mexicans, nearly 
half of which was cavalry. Rapidly forming on foot, 
the Americans held their fire until the enemy came 
within easy range, when they opened upon them with 
destructive effect. At the same time Captain Eeid, who 
had succeeded in mounting some fifteen or twenty of his 
men, broke through the Mexican ranks and threw them 



208 MISSOURI. 

into confusion. In less than half an hour the skirmish 
was over and the Mexicans were in full retreat, " leaving 
sixty-three killed, one hundred and fifty wounded, and 
one howitzer, the only piece of artillery in the engage- 
ment on either side." The loss of the Americans was 
eight wounded, none killed. 

Resuming their march, the Americans entered El Paso 
on the 27th without opposition, and there they learned 
from prisoners and others of the change that had been 
made in General Wool's movements, and that so far 
from being in possession of the city of Chihuahua he had 
not even " marched upon the state." This was not very 
encouraging, but Doniphan determined to press on, 
though Chihuahua was still two hundred and twenty-five 
miles distant, and not a little of the route lay through a 
desert waste. Under the circumstances, he did not think 
it prudent to adventure further without artillery, and 
he ordered down from Santa Fe Captain Weightman's 
company, with a battery of six guns, under command of 
Major M. L. Clark. 

This involved a delay of some weeks, but the 8th of 
February found him once more on the march, at the 
head of nine hundred and twenty-four effective men, and 
singularly enough with a caravan of over three hundred 
traders' wagons, which he was supposed to be escorting. 
On the 28th, at the pass of the Sacramento, fifteen miles 
from Chihuahua, " the enemy was discovered strongly 
posted on high ground, fortified by entrenchments and 
well supplied with artillery." After an effective cannon- 
ade, Colonel Doniphan advanced to the attack with seven 
dismounted companies in line and three mounted ; but 
the battle was decided by the charge of two twelve- 
pound howitzers, under Captain Weightman, supported 



CONQUEST OF NEW MEXICO. 209 

by the cavalry and followed up by the dismounted troops 
and the rest of the artillery. In this charge the howitz- 
ers were not unlimbered until they were within fifty yards 
of the enemy's redoubts, and the cavalry riding up to the 
brink of the entrenchments drove the Mexican gunners 
from their pieces. Unable to withstand this onset, the 
Mexicans retreated, closely followed by the Americans, 
until night put an end to the conflict. In this engage- 
ment the Mexicans had about four thousand men, of 
whom some fifteen hundred were rancheros, badly armed 
with lassos, lances, and machetes or corn-knives, and 
their loss is given at three hundred killed, as many 
wounded, and forty prisoners. The Americans, as has 
been said, had nine hundred and twenty-four effective 
men, to which number must be added two companies of 
teamsters, under Samuel C. Owens, of Missouri, and a 
few amateur soldiers, which carried the total force up to 
eleven hundred and sixty-four men. Of this number 
but one, Owens, was killed, though eleven were wounded, 
three of whom subsequently died. 

On the 1st of March, 1847, the day after the battle, 
Doniphan took possession of Chihuahua, and here he re- 
mained until the 28th of April, when, in obedience to 
orders from General Taylor, he set out for Saltillo and 
Matamoras, nine hundred miles distant, but not until 
he had provided, as far as it was possible to do so, for 
the safety of the traders whom he now left behind. 
The march to Saltillo was a hard one owing to the want 
of transportation and the scarcity of water, but it was 
successfully accomplished, and would, perhaps, have 
passed without incident had it not been for the severe 
punishment which Captain Reid and a detachment of 
thirty-five Americans inflicted upon a marauding band 



210 MISSOURI. 

of Indians at the request of the people of Parras, and 
in grateful recognition of the kindness which they had 
shown to the sick of General Wool's command. Take 
it all in all, this rescue of eighteen Mexican boys and 
girls from a captivity worse than death by a party of 
Missouri troopers was a novel and pleasing episode ; and 
as it was, in its origin and ending, as creditable to the 
Mexicans as to the Americans, and was, moreover, a fair 
illustration of Western character, it is here given in the 
words of Jose Ignacio Arabe, the prefect of Parras. 
Under elate of May 18th he thus addresses Captain 
Reid : — 

" At the first notice that the barbarians, after killing 
many and taking captives, were returning to their haunts, 
you generously and bravely offered ... to fight them 
on their crossing by the Pozo, executing this enterprise 
with celerity, address, and bravery worthy of all eulogy, 
and worthy of the brilliant issue which all celebrate. 
You recovered many animals and much plundered prop- 
erty, and eighteen captives were restored to liberty and 
to social enjoyments, their souls overflowing with a lively 
sentiment of joy and gratitude which all the inhabitants 
of this town equally breathe in favor of their generous 
deliverers and their valiant chief. The half of the In- 
dians killed in the combat, and those which fly wounded, 
do not calm the pain which all feel for the wound which 
Your Excellency received defending Christians and civil- 
ized beings against the rage and brutality of savages. 
All desire the speedy reestablishment of your health, 
and although they know that in your own noble soul will 
be found the best reward of your conduct, they desire 
also to address you the expression of their gratitude and 
high esteem. I am honored in being the organ of the 



CONQUEST OF NEW MEXICO. 211 

public sentiment, and pray you to accept it, with the as- 
surance of my most distinguished esteem." 

On the 22d of May the Missourians, " rough, ragged, 
and ready," reached General Wool's lines near Saltillo ; 
and the next day, as the term of their enlistment was 
rapidly drawing to a close and there was no prospect of 
further need of their services, Captain Weightman turned 
over the battery which he had so worthily commanded 
to the officer who was appointed to receive it. The ten 
guns which had been captured at Sacramento were, by 
permission of General Taylor, conveyed to Missouri and 
deposited with the state authorities at Jefferson City, 
subject to the action of the War Department at Wash- 
ington. 

Leaving Saltillo, the Missourians proceeded by rela- 
tively slow and easy marches to Brazos Island, at the 
mouth of the Rio Grande, where they arrived on the 9th 
of June ; and the following day they embarked for New 
Orleans and home. With their arrival on the shores of 
the gulf this extraordinary march came to an end. In- 
cluding the Navajo expedition, it had extended over a 
distance of three thousand miles, through an uninhabited 
or a hostile country, often without water or supplies of 
any kind ; and it had been made in the face of difficulties 
which tested to the utmost the endurance of those who 
took part in it. That they were able to accomplish it 
with a loss of less than fifty men, counting those who fell 
in the sharply contested action at Sacramento, speaks 
volumes for the material of the command, and justly 
entitled them to the enthusiastic welcome which they re- 
ceived on their return. Considered, however, as a fac- 
tor in the military problem, assuming this to have been 
the capture of the city of Mexico, the work performed 



212 MISSOURI. 

by this column loses much of its importance, owing to 
the adoption of the route by way of Vera Cruz instead 
of that by way of Zacatecas and San Luis Potosi, over 
which Taylor had proposed to advance ; but if we esti- 
mate it by its final results, we shall have to admit that 
the conquest and occupation of New Mexico simplified 
the task of the American commissioner when negotiating 
the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, and made it possible 
for him so to perfect the title to the territory which we 
then gained that, compared with that by which Germany 
now holds Alsace and Lorraine, it may be said to be 
without a flaw either in law or morals. 

But whilst we have been following the march of 
Doniphan and his men, New Mexico was the scene 
of a bloody uprising, which led to the death of Gov- 
ernor Charles Bent, and threatened the supremacy of 
the Americans. Benton tells us that it was due to the 
machinations of a certain Diego Archuleta, the second 
in command under Governor Armijo, and intimates 
that Archuleta's course was dictated by the conviction 
that he had been cheated in the intrigue to which he 
is said to have been a party, by virtue of which he 
was to have been permitted to make himself master of 
so much of the province as lay to the west of the Rio 
Grande, in consideration of the surrender of Santa Fe 
to the Americans. So far as Archuleta was concerned 
this may well have been true. Certainly, if the story 
of the intrigue be accepted, and if, furthermore, it be 
admitted that he was led to believe that Magoffin, who 
seems to have been the tempter in this case, was acting 
by the authority of the United States, it will be easy to 
understand why, having fulfilled his part of the iniqui- 
tous bargain, he should have regarded Kearney's procla- 



CONQUEST OF NEW MEXICO. 213 

mation annexing the whole of New Mexico as an attempt 
to get rid of him without paying him for his services. 
But even if all this were true, we must not forget that 
Archuleta was only one of the prime-movers in this re- 
volt, and apparently not the ruling spirit among them ; 
and base and sordid as may have been the motives 
that governed his conduct, there is not the slightest 
ground for supposing that the co-conspirators were in- 
fluenced by any such considerations. Their course may 
have been dictated by high patriotic motives. In fact 
the evidence all seems to point that way, for Colonel 
Price, of the 2d Missouri, who was left in command of 
the troops stationed in the territory, writing under date 
of July, 1847, speaks of " the deadly hostility " with 
which the New Mexicans regarded the Americans, and 
it is not probable that the feeling was any less bitter in 
the months immediately succeeding the occupation, or 
whilst the so-called revolt was in progress. 

Under any circumstances the dismemberment of a 
nation or the forcible annexation of one people by an- 
other, especially when they differ in race and religion, is 
not a gentle process ; and when it is attended, as was 
the case in the present instance, by radical changes in 
their mode of government and in their laws and cus- 
toms, it inevitably gives rise to a deep-seated feeling of 
hostility which may be suppressed by the strong hand, 
but which only awaits a favorable opportunity to burst 
forth into acts of open, and, we may add, justifiable war- 
fare. When an outbreak of this character is successful, 
or if, perchance, the story be told of ourselves, the move- 
ment is always ascribed to patriotic ardor ; but if, on the 
other hand, it result in failure, or if we happen to be the 
sufferers, then it is characterized by other and less high- 



214 MISSOURI. 

sounding terms. In a struggle of this kind, the losers, 
like the absent, are always in the wrong, and such seems 
to have been the case with the New Mexicans in the 
effort which they made to throw off the yoke that had 
been imposed on them. Evidently they had never ac- 
cepted the situation, and although the conditions were 
not favorable to a reenactment on this distant field and 
at this late day of the " Sicilian Vespers," yet they gal- 
lantly made the attempt ; and but for the promptness of 
the American commander in attacking the insurrection- 
ary force before it had perfected its organization, the 
result might have been different. 

According to the vague and somewhat incomplete ac- 
counts that have come down to us, the first mutterings 
of the storm were heard about the middle of December, 
only four months after the occupation of Santa ¥6, 
during which period the plans of the conspirators had 
been so far matured that the 25th of the month, the 
day on which Doniphan fought the skirmish at Bracito, 
was chosen for the uprising. Colonel Price, however, 
had received an intimation of the impending danger, and 
he at once took measures to meet and counteract it. Sev- 
eral arrests were made, and for the time being the prog- 
ress of the movement seemed to have been checked. 
The affair, however, had gone too far to admit of any 
other mode of settlement than by an appeal to the sword, 
and for this the Americans were not yet prepared. 
Indeed so secure did they feel that Governor Bent, 
on the 14th of January, 1847, left Santa Fe' on a visit 
to his family at Taos, distant about seventy miles ; and 
here he was when, on the 19th, a revolutionary force took 
possession of the place, and murdered him and several 
other government officials, among whom was Cornelio 



CONQUEST OF NEW MEXICO. 215 

Vigil, the prefect, a native of New Mexico. Similar 
outbreaks took place at Arroyo Hondo, Mora, and other 
places in this portion of the territory, during which a 
number of Americans, and of those who were supposed 
to be favorable to them, lost their lives. 

The news of the uprising at Taos and the murder of 
Governor Bent was brought to Colonel Price on the 
day after it occurred, and he immediately sent orders 
to Major Edmonson of his regiment, at Albuquerque, to 
move up to Santa Fe and take command there, whilst 
he himself marched against the insurgents, who were re- 
ported to be advancing and rapidly gaining in strength. 
On the 23d, he set out at the head of only three hun- 
dred and fifty men, consisting in great part of the dis- 
mounted troopers of his own regiment, and on the next 
day he encountered the enemy near the village of Can- 
ada, where they were posted on heights commanding the 
road, and in some strong adobe houses at the foot of the 
hills. After a sharp skirmish, in which the brunt of the 
fight seems to have been borne by Captain Angney's 
battalion of (Missouri) infantry, and St. Vrain's company 
of volunteers from Santa Fe, the enemy were driven 
from every position, and retreated, leaving thirty-six of 
their number dead on the field, while the Americans had 
to lament the loss of two killed and seven wounded. 
Following up his success, Price reached Luceros on the 
28th, where he was joined by Captain Burgwin, with one 
company of the first dragoons and a six-pound cannon. 
This increased the number of his available men to four 
hundred and eighty, and with this force he marched on 
Taos, whither the enemy fled after a second skirmish, 
which took place at Embudo. After a hard march of 
several days, during a portion of which the snow was 



216 MISSOURI. 

so deep that the soldiers were obliged to break the way 
for the artillery and baggage wagons, he reached the vil- 
lage of San Fernando de Taos, through which he passed 
on his way to the pueblo of the same name, where the 
insurgents had taken refuge. This place was " inclosed 
by formidable walls and strong pickets, within which 
were two large buildings of irregular pyramidal form, 
seven or eight stories in height. Besides these dwelling- 
houses, each capable of sheltering five or six hundred 
men, there was a large church situated in the north- 
west angle of the inclosure, with a narrow passage be- 
tween it and the outer wall." All these buildings were 
of adobe, — sun-dried bricks, — and it was no doubt 
owing to this fact, to the thickness of these walls, and to 
their singularly defensive form, pierced as they were for 
rifles, that the besieged were able to resist, during the 
better part of two days, an attack in which the guns, 
under Lieutenants Dyer (afterwards chief of ordnance) 
and Wilson, were served at unusually short range. 

Into the details of this siege we do not propose to 
enter, though some idea may be formed of the difficulty 
of the undertaking and the obstinacy of the defense from 
the fact that at eleven o'clock on the morning of the sec- 
ond day, Price, finding that it was impossible to breach 
the walls of the church with his cannon, ordered the build- 
ing to be stormed. At a given signal Captain Burg- 
win, with his own company and one of the 2d Missouri, 
" charged upon the western flank of the church ; " while 
Captain Angney, with his battalion of infantry and an- 
other company of the 2d Missouri, attacked the northern 
wall. As soon as the troops under Captain Burgwin had 
established themselves on their side of the church, they 
began to cut their way through the wall with axes. 



CONQUEST OF NEW MEXICO. 217 

After some hours of this kind of work, during which 
Capt. Burg win was mortally wounded, " the six-pounder 
was run up within sixty yards of the church, and after 
ten rounds, one of the holes which had been cut with 
axes was widened into a practicable breach." Through 
this the stormers entered, and the building was carried 
without further resistance. 

This virtually put an end to the conflict; for the 
enemy, in their haste to escape, either fled to the neigh- 
boring mountains, or took refuge in the large communal 
houses in other parts of the village. The next morning, 
in answer to their supplications, Colonel Price agreed to 
a peace on condition that they would deliver up Tomas, 
one of their leading men, who was said to have been 
actively engaged in the murder of Governor Bent. This 
was done, and Tomas was taken to San Fernando de 
Taos and confined in the guard-house, where he was 
shortly afterwards shot by a private soldier. The num- 
ber of the enemy, Mexicans and Pueblo Indians, en- 
gaged in this battle was estimated by Colonel Price at 
between six and seven hundred, of whom one hundred 
and fifty were reported killed. On the side of the Ameri- 
cans the loss was seven killed and forty-five wounded, 
many of whom died. 

With the fall of this pueblo the revolt may be said to 
have been brought to an end. Of those who were 
prominently concerned in it, a few died in action, while 
others, among whom was Archuleta, took time by the 
forelock and escaped. Fifteen, seven of whom were 
Pueblo Indians, were accused of treason, — a crime of 
which, under the circumstances, they could not have 
been guilty, — and having been tried and convicted by a 
court which had no jurisdiction in the matter, they were 



218 MISSOURI. 

promptly executed. This was but little better than a 
judicial murder ; and that such was the opinion of the 
cabinet at Washington is evident from the wav in 
which President Polk treated those cases that were rec- 
ommended to him for mercy. To have pardoned them 
would have been to acknowledge the legality of the sen- 
tence under which they were to suffer, while, on the 
other hand, to have refused to do so would have been 
to make himself, in a measure, responsible for the out- 
rage upon law and justice by which they were con- 
demned ; and so, if we may trust Benton's account, he 
solved the difficulty by instructing the authorities in 
New Mexico quietly to turn them loose. 

Notwithstanding the severity of the measures taken 
for the suppression of the uprising, affairs within the 
territory continued for some months to be in a very un- 
settled condition, and intercourse between Santa F^ and 
Missouri became very unsafe. Trains were captured 
and pillaged, distant grazing camps were attacked and 
the animals stampeded, and not unfrequently cases of 
the murder of isolated parties of Americans occurred. 
These outrages, it is true, were not the result of a con- 
certed attempt on the part of the Mexicans to drive out 
the invaders, but were the work of individual bands of 
marauders, red as well as white, who were bent on rob- 
bery ; and although the perpetrators when caught met 
with a short shrift, yet they were so numerous, and their 
depredations so daring, that, joined to the rumors of an- 
other insurrection and of the approach of a large hostile 
force from the South, Colonel Price was led, in the let- 
ter to which we have already referred, to ask for addi- 
tional troops to take the place of those whose terms of 
service were about to expire. 



CONQUEST OF NEW MEXICO. 219 

These were promptly furnished, his call for reinforce- 
ments having been anticipated, and by autumn the 
available force in New Mexico was raised to three thou- 
sand men by the arrival of fresh regiments, which, 
with but one exception, were from Missouri. With this 
force, about twice as large as that which had originally 
taken possession of the province, Colonel or as he must 
now be called General Price, found no difficulty in restor- 
ing order and in maintaining the advantages which had 
already been gained. In an incredibly short time the 
people of New Mexico submitted to the situation, and the 
treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, concluded in February, 
1848, so far from effecting any change in their condi- 
tion, merely gave a legal sanction to what was an accom- 
plished fact. New Mexico to all intents and purposes 
was already a territory of the United States ; and if we 
except the few companies of the first dragoons, whose 
gallant services there is no wish to disparage, it was 
made so by Missouri volunteers. Of the seven thousand 
men whom she sent to the war, over six thousand were 
employed in the conquest and pacification of this prov- 
ince ; and there can be no question that it was the thor- 
oughness with which they did their work that made it 
relatively an easy matter for the Mexican authorities to 
part with all this region in return for the very handsome 
monetary consideration which they received. 



CHAPTER XI. 

THE JACKSON RESOLUTIONS. INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS. 

EDUCATION. 

The acquisition of California and New Mexico was 
made the occasion for reviving the slavery issue, though 
it assumed a different form from that which it had 
worn in 1820, when the adoption of the Missouri Com- 
promise put a stop, temporarily, to the agitation of the 
question. At that time, it will be remembered, slavery 
existed in all the territory west of the Mississippi 
owned by the United States ; and the effect of the com- 
promise then adopted was to transform the northern 
portion of that vast region from possible slave to actual 
free territory. Now the conditions were reversed. 
California and New Mexico, so far as negro slavery 
was concerned, were free — made so by the law of 
Mexico ; and to extend the line of thirty-six degrees 
and thirty minutes north latitude through them and on 
to the Pacific Ocean, as the Southern representatives 
insisted upon doing, was to transfer the southern por- 
tions of those territories from actual freedom to possible 
slavery. In other words, in the one instance slavery 
was excluded from a region in which it legally existed, 
whilst in the other it was in contemplation to make it 
legally possible in territories where it had been pro- 
hibited by the laws of the country to which they had be- 
longed. This a large majority of the people of the 



THE JACKSON RESOLUTIONS. 221 

North were anxious to prevent ; arid to this end they 
not only opposed the extension of the line of the Mis- 
souri Compromise into the newly acquired territories, 
but their representatives in Washington endeavored so 
to shape the action of Congress as to prohibit, by legisla- 
tive enactments, the introduction of slavery into any part 
of this region. 

To all such legislation the people of Missouri were 
opposed ; not that they were necessarily in favor of 
the extension of the area of slavery, but for the reason 
that they either did not believe that Congress had the 
power, under the Constitution, to legislate upon the 
subject, or because, admitting that Congress had the 
power, they did not deem its exercise advisable, believing 
as they did that the people of a territory, when framing 
their State Constitution, ought to be left free to decide 
as to the institutions under which they were to live. 
Upon this point their ideas were very clear, and in 
January, 1849, the legislature of the State embodied 
them in a series of resolutions intended for the guidance 
of their members of Congress. In local history, these 
resolutions are known as the "Jackson resolutions" 
from the fact that Governor C. F. Jackson was chair- 
man of the committee that reported them ; though they 
were introduced into the Senate by Carty Wells, of 
Marion County, and were originally drawn up, so it was 
said, by Judge W. B. Napton, of the supreme court, a 
learned lawyer, an upright judge, and a most estimable 
citizen. 

After a stormy debate, which was but a prelude to 
the heated political contest that was to follow, the entire 
series was adopted, the Whigs opposing, while the 
Democrats, who had a large majority in both branches 



222 Missouri. 

of the General Assembly, were, with few exceptions, in 
favor of it. Notwithstanding the almost unanimous vote 
which they had given to these resolutions, the Democrats 
soon found that instead of being a bond of union and a 
source of strength, they were a cause of discord and an 
element of weakness. Benton, in open Senate, refused 
to be bound by them on the ground that, like Calhoun's 
resolutions, of which they were to some extent a copy, 
they contemplated secession and did not truly represent 
the opinions of the people of the State ; and it was this 
refusal that led to the split in his party and brought 
about his defeat after a service of thirty years in the 
Senate of the United States. 

So far as these resolutions can be said to have 
threatened disunion, there can be no question that Ben- 
ton was right, and that they did not reflect the senti- 
ments of the people of the State ; but whether, admit- 
ting that they did contemplate secession, he was equally 
correct in charging that all who supported them were 
aiming at such a result is a point about which opinions 
may well differ. At this time there was probably not 
a handful of people in the State who believed that mat- 
ters would ever be carried to such an extreme as to lead 
to secession ; and to understand these resolutions aright 
it is necessary to bear in mind that they are to be inter- 
preted, not by the events which subsequently took place, 
but by the opinions that were current among those 
by whom they were adopted. Tried by this standard, 
the vague threat or warning which they contain may 
be said to have been a mere bit of stage thunder, 
meaning anything or nothing, according to the fancy of 
the person who used it, and therefore harmless so long 
as there was no attempt made to carry it into execu- 



THE JACKSON RESOLUTIONS. 223 

tion. Neither then, nor at any subsequent period, did 
any considerable number of the people of Missouri ever 
look to the secession of their State as a remedy for the 
injustice of which they felt they had a right to complain. 
Not even by the most ardent supporters of these resolu- 
tions was such an idea generally entertained ; for among 
them are to be found not only some of those who after- 
wards followed the fortunes of Benton, but also others 
who, like Governor Robert M. Stewart, did what they 
could to defeat him, though when the crisis came, ten 
years later, they were among the stanchest defenders 
of the Union. But this is not a matter upon which it 
is necessary to enlarge. All that we are interested in 
knowing is that these resolutions proved to be the wedge 
that split the Democratic party, and gave the Whigs a 
Senator in place of Benton. For this reason, and be- 
cause of the important part which they played in the po- 
litical affairs of the State during the next few years, 
they are here given in full : — 

" Resolved by the General Assembly of the State of 
Missouri : That the federal Constitution was the re- 
sult of a compromise between the conflicting interests 
of the States which formed it, and in no part of that in- 
strument is to be found any delegation of power to Con- 
gress to legislate on the subject of slavery, excepting 
some special provisions having in view the prospective 
abolition of the African slave trade and for the recovery 
of fugitive slaves. Any attempt, therefore, on the part 
of Congress to legislate on the subject, so as to affect 
the institution of slavery in the States, in the District of 
Columbia, or in the Territories, is, to say the least, a vio- 
lation of the principles upon which that instrument was 
founded. 



224 Missouri. 

" 2. That the territories, acquired by the blood and 
treasure of the whole nation, ought to be governed for 
the common benefit of the people of all the States, and 
any organization of the territorial government, exclud- 
ing the citizens of any part of the Union from removing 
to such territories with their property, would be an ex- 
ercise of power by Congress inconsistent with the spirit 
upon which our federal compact was based, insulting to 
the sovereignty and dignity of the States thus affected, 
calculated to alienate one portion of the Union from 
another, and tending ultimately to disunion. 

" 3. That this General Assembly regard the conduct of 
the Northern States on the subject of slavery as releas- 
ing the slaveholding States from all further adherence 
to the basis of compromise fixed on by the act of Congress 
of March 6, 1820, even if such act ever did impose any 
obligation upon the slaveholding States, and authorizes 
them to insist upon their rights under the Constitution ; 
but for the sake of harmony, and for the preservation of 
our federal Union, they will still sanction the applica- 
tion of the principles of the Missouri Compromise to the 
recent territorial acquisitions, if by such concession fu- 
ture aggressions upon the equal rights of the States may 
be arrested, and the spirit of anti-slavery fanaticism be 
extinguished. 

" 4. That the right to prohibit slavery in any territory 
belongs exclusively to the people thereof, and can only 
be exercised by them in forming their constitution for a 
state government, or in their sovereign capacity as an 
independent State. 

" 5. That in the event of the passage of any act of 
Congress conflicting with the principles herein expressed, 
Missouri will be found in hearty cooperation with the 



THE JACKSON RESOLUTIONS. 225 

slaveholding States, in such measures as may be deemed 
necessary for our mutual protection against the en- 
croachments of Northern fanaticism." 

Leaving out of consideration the covert threat and 
the somewhat truculent language in which these resolu- 
tions are couched, and regarding slaves simply as prop- 
erty, as they were subsequently decided to be by the 
highest tribunal in the land, it is difficult to find any- 
thing in the positions here taken to which a fair-minded 
person can reasonably object. Benton, however, as has 
been said, refused to abide by them, and appealed from 
the legislature to the people of the State. His reasons 
have been briefly^ indicated, though it is proper to add 
that back of them, and lying far deeper, was his belief 
in the evil of slavery. Upon this point, his position 
cannot be mistaken ; and it is worthy of note that it was 
his conviction as to the difficulty of getting rid of the 
evil when it was once firmly established — a conviction 
shared by many thoughtful men in the State — that 
made him all the more determined in his opposition to 
any measure that made its extension possible. " The 
incurability of the evil," he said, on a subsequent occa- 
sion, " is the greatest objection to the extension of 
slavery. If it is wrong for the legislature to inflict an 
evil which can be cured, how much more to inflict one 
that is incurable and against the will of the people who 
are to endure it forever. I quarrel with no one for 
deeming slavery a blessing ; I deem it an evil, and 
would neither adopt it, nor impose it upon others." 
How the problem was finally to be solved in regions 
where slavery existed seemed to him, as he frankly con- 
fessed, to be beyond the reach of human wisdom ; but, 
added he, " there is a wisdom above human, and to that 



226 Missouri. 

we must look. In the mean time do not extend the 
evil." 

This is certainly a strong presentation of the case ; 
and if it had been made in opposition to an attempt on 
the part of Congress to legislate slavery into a region 
where it had not previously existed, it would not have 
been easy to frame a satisfactory reply. But, in point 
of fact, Congress was not asked or expected to do any- 
thing of the kind. All that these resolutions demanded 
was that Congress should not interfere in the matter, 
save, perhaps, in the way of compromise. What was 
wanted was that the question should be left open, so 
that the people of the slaveholding States might go into 
any of the territories which they had helped to acquire, 
taking their slave property with them in case they so 
desired, upon the same footing as that upon which the 
people of the free North were permitted to move into 
these same territories with their horses, or any other 
articles of personal property that they might possess. 
Of course, in such an event it was possible that the peo- 
ple in some of these territories, when framing their state 
constitutions, might see fit to sanction slavery, though 
this was by no means certain. But even if it had been, 
it would hardly have afforded any just grounds for op- 
posing the policy of " non-interference," as it was called, 
since the question was not whether Congress should or 
should not legislate slavery into the territories, but 
whether it should leave the people of each territory free 
to decide that matter for themselves. Between these 
two courses there was a wide difference ; and whilst in 
the former case Benton's argument would have been per- 
fectly relevant, in the latter it was out of place, for the 
reason that there was no necessary connection between 



THE JACKSON RESOLUTIONS. 227 

a desire to extend slavery into the new territories and a 
denial of the power of Congress to legislate upon the 
subject. Indeed, the very reverse of this was true, since 
it was possible to be a believer in the constitutionality 
of the doctrine of " non-interference," and to be opposed 
to the extension of the slave area. In other words, a 
person might be in favor of transforming a territory 
into a free State, when the time came to make the 
change, though he denied the power of Congress to pre- 
vent the introduction of slaves into that territory, as 
lono 1 as it remained in that condition. So far from in- 
volving any inconsistency, this position was perfectly 
logical ; and as subsequent events abundantly showed, 
it was the position held by a large proportion of the 
people of the State, including some of those who voted 
for the resolutions, and who were known as anti-Benton 
Democrats, or " Softs." 

Benton did not recognize this fact, or, what is far more 
probable, he did not think it necessary to take advan- 
tage of it ; otherwise it would have been easy for him, 
without any very great sacrifice of opinion, so to shape 
his course as to conciliate those of the malcontents in 
his own party who, whilst differing with him as to the 
means by which they hoped to attain a certain end, fully 
agreed with him as to the end itself. Unfortunately for 
the success of his candidacy, a spirit of conciliation 
formed no part of Benton's disposition, and the experi- 
ence of a quarter of a century and more, during which 
he had been the acknowledged leader of the party that 
controlled the political destinies of the State, had not 
been of such a character as to lead him to cultivate that 
virtue. Gifted with superb courage, physical as well as 
moral, and possessed of an imperious will, he was prob- 



228 Missouri. 

ably never more at home than when engaged in one of 
those fierce political contests in which quarter was 
neither given nor expected. In all such cases his prac- 
tice had been to crush, not placate ; and in the present 
instance his natural tendency to deal with his opponents 
in this summary fashion was no doubt strengthened by 
the conviction that those who supported these resolutions 
were secretly aiming at disunion. With all such, or 
with those whom he only suspected of such a purpose, 
Benton held no terms. Devotion to the Union had 
come to be with him the one ruling idea, and thus it 
may have happened to him, as it not unfrequently does 
to strong natures, when similarly placed, that he mis- 
took the individual prejudices and animosities that had 
sprung from the stormy debates in which he had parti- 
cipated, for the dictates of reason and patriotism. Such, 
in fact, appears to have been the case. By some inex- 
plicable process he had satisfied himself that Calhoun's 
object was to bring about a separation of the States, and 
as these resolutions which he was called on to obey em- 
bodied the South Carolinian's views as to the power of 
Congress to legislate upon the subject of slavery, he not 
unnaturally transferred to those who had been instru- 
mental in securing their adoption a portion of the per- 
sonal hostility with which he appears to have regarded 
that greatly misrepresented and much-abused man and 
every measure with which he was prominently identi- 
fied. 

The circumstances, however, were very different, 
now, from what they had been during the earlier por- 
tion of Benton's career. A generation of voters had 
grown up who "knew not Joseph," and among them 
were a number of comparatively young men, who were 



THE JACKSON RESOLUTIONS. 229 

ambitious of political preferment, and who afterwards 
attained and wore worthily the highest honors within the 
gift of the people of the State. As a rule, they were 
men who, in the expressive idiom of the time, were ac- 
customed to do their own thinking ; and as they re- 
garded the political situation through an altogether dif- 
ferent medium from that which enveloped the Capitol at 
Washington, they may be excused if they failed to see 
in these resolutions the evidence of a purpose to break 
up the Union. They had yet to learn that the assertion 
of the rights to which they believed they were entitled 
under the Constitution was a political crime ; and they 
were not ready to admit that the declaration of their 
intention to make common cause with the other slave- 
holding States in case of a refusal on the part of the 
free and populous North to grant these rights was proof 
of disloyalty. It did not need the authority of Webster 
to convince them that " a bargain broken on one side is 
broken on all sides." 

When, therefore, Benton, in the course of the tremen- 
dous struggle which he now made for the retention of 
his political power, asserted that an adherence to these 
resolutions would inevitably lead to secession, and con- 
tended that those who knowingly supported them were 
endeavoring to bring about such a result, the charge 
was met by an indignant denial. It was all the an- 
swer to which it was entitled ; for, like so many other 
attempts that have been made to impeach the motives of 
an entire party on the strength of an induction, it was 
based upon a false premise, the exceptions being too 
numerous to justify the conclusion. But even if this 
had not been so, and his opponents had been as disloyal 
as he painted them, it would not have helped his cause, 



230 MISSOURI. 

for the reason that the people of the State could not 
be made to believe that the political situation was as 
urgent as he insisted that it was. So far were they 
from sharing in his apprehensions that there never was 
a time when they were more actively engaged in advanc- 
ing their private interests and pushing forward those 
measures upon which the future welfare and prosperity 
of the State were thought to depend. Hence it was that 
almost the only effect of the appeal, and of the fierce per- 
sonal element which he introduced into the canvass, was 
to make the breach between his former friends and ad- 
herents practically irreparable. 

In this factional fight the Whigs took no immediate 
part. They had no love for Benton ; and whilst it is 
probable that a majority of them would, if put to the 
test, have sympathized with him in his opposition to the 
extension of slavery into territory then free, as they cer- 
tainly did in his denunciation of everything that savored 
of secession, yet they did not regard the situation as be- 
ing serious enough to call upon them to forget old party 
affiliations so far as to aid in giving him a new lease of 
power. For thirty years, during much of which time 
they had been taught to look upon him as the embodi- 
ment of all that was politically evil, they had steadily 
but unsuccessfully opposed him and his methods, and 
they were not prepared to abandon the contest now, 
when they saw the prize of victory almost within their 
grasp. Accordingly, they kept their organization intact ; 
and the result of the election which occurred in the 
summer of 1850 fully justified this policy. In the tri- 
angular contest which then took place, they succeeded in 
returning sixty-four members to the General Assembly, 
one of whose duties it was to choose a United States 



THE JACKSON RESOLUTIONS. 231 

Senator in place of Benton. This gave them a plurality 
in that body, as the Benton men, who came next in point 
of numbers, were only able to elect fifty-five, and the 
anti-Benton men, or " Softs," had to be content with 
thirty-eight. 1 On the 10th of January, 1851, the legisla- 
ture met in joint session, but failed to elect, neither party 
having a majority of all the votes cast. Finally, after 
some ten or twelve days spent in voting by day and cau- 
cussing by night, a break occurred in the ranks of the anti- 
Benton men, and on the fortieth ballot enough of them, 
under the lead of Senator Robert M. Stewart, went over 
to Henry S. Geyer, the Whig candidate, to secure his 
election, the vote being, for Geyer 80, Benton 55, String- 
fellow (anti-Benton Democrat) 18, and 5 anti-Benton 
men scattering. 

With this defeat Benton's official career may be said 
to have been brought to a close ; for although he repre- 
sented the St. Louis district in the Congress of 1852-54, 
during which the Kansas-Nebraska bill was passed, and 
was conspicuous in his opposition to that measure, yet in 
his own State he was steadily losing ground. The prin- 
ciple of non-interference by Congress in the domestic 
affairs of a territory which was then formally announced, 
and the consequent abrogation, in specific terms, of the 
Missouri Compromise, had come to be regarded as a car- 
dinal doctrine by one wing of the Democratic party, and 
the current of opinion in its favor was too strong to be 
successfully resisted. At the next election Benton was 
beaten by Luther M. Kennett, formerly a Whig, but 
who now ran as a Native American, or "Know Noth- 
ing," the Whigs, as a party, having disappeared from 

1 This was the first vote given for senator on January 10, 
1851, hut there were two members absent and one had died. 



232 Missouri. 

the field of Missouri politics. In 1856 he again came 
before the public for their suffrages, this time as a 
candidate for the office of governor. Although sev- 
enty-four years of age, and suffering from an incurable 
disease, yet, in the course of the canvass which he then 
made, he traveled over the entire State, a distance of 
some twelve hundred miles, and made forty speeches, 
each one of which was one or two hours in length. Un- 
der the circumstances this was, as his biographer well 
says, "a remarkable feat," but it was without avail. 
His star was on the wane, and in the poll which then 
took place he was third, receiving less than twenty-eight 
thousand votes, out of a total of one hundred and fifteen 
thousand. In the senatorial election, or elections, for, 
owing to a failure to elect at the previous session, two 
of them came off during the ensuing winter, his friends 
once more brought him forward, but with no better suc- 
cess. 

This was his last appearance in the political arena, 
though in the autumn of 1856 " he made, by request, a 
lecturing tour in New England, speaking on the danger 
of the political situation and the imperative necessity of 
preserving the Union, which he now saw to be gravely 
threatened." In April, 1858, he quietly passed away at 
his house in Washington, busy to the last upon the liter- 
ary work to which he devoted himself when he first lost 
his seat in Congress, and which is, after all, the founda- 
tion upon which his claims to remembrance must rest. 
As a Senator and in matters of national concern he was 
overshadowed by some of his compeers ; and in bring- 
ing forward and advocating measures like the bills to 
repeal the salt tax, to graduate the price of the public 
lands, and, perhaps, some others that were of special 



INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS. 233 

service to the State and section, and which could hardly 
have been carried without his support, he cannot justly 
be credited with originality, since he was but following 
in paths that were by no means new. The one measure 
which may be said to have been peculiarly his own, and 
upon which he certainly prided himself, was the " Ex- 
punging Resolution," as it was called ; and this, to say 
the least, was a piece of child's play, unworthy of Benton, 
and beneath the consideration of any deliberative body 
that aimed at official dignity. 

Amid the turmoil and excitement attending these 
political contests it is a satisfaction to be able to say that 
the material and educational interests of the State were 
not neglected. In February, 1849, shortly after the 
adoption of the Jackson resolutions, the legislature au- 
thorized the construction of the Missouri Pacific Railroad 
from the city of St. Louis to the western border of the 
State. The preliminary surveys were at once begun, 
and in July, 1850, " ground was formally broken " at 
the eastern end of the line. It was the first permanent 
work of the kind done within the State, though it was 
not by any means the first essay which the people of 
Missouri had made in the field of internal improvements. 
As early as 1836, they had awoke to the fact that the 
Missouri, the Mississippi, and their tributaries did not 
afford all the means of intercommunication necessary to 
the development of the different sections of the State. 
Centres of population had sprung up at a distance from 
these great commercial highways, and it was a matter of 
the first importance to provide them with outlets for their 
surplus products. The dirt roads on which the people 
had hitherto been dependent were often impassable, and 
the mode of transportation which they afforded was felt 



234 Missouri. 

to be too slow to suit the fast increasing wants of the 
age. Accordingly, the legislature which met in that 
year chartered a number of roads, though it is evident 
from an examination of these charters that the people of 
the State had not yet formed any very clear ideas as to 
the relative value of steam or horses as a motive power, 
and were, in fact, somewhat undecided as to what sort of 
road they really wanted, whether of plank, rail, or simple 
macadam. But whilst they may be said to have been in 
doubt upon this important point, they appear to have 
had no misgivings as to the possible earnings of these 
roads. At least, this is the not unnatural inference 
from the fact that upon some of them the prospective 
dividends were, by the terms of their charters, limited 
to twenty per cent. — a wise precaution no doubt under 
certain contingencies, but needless in the present case. 
Fortunately for Missouri, her legislators were not so 
far dazzled by visions of the golden harvest that was 
to follow upon the completion of these roads, as to lead 
them to commit the State to the task of carrying out 
the system of internal improvements which they had 
authorized. Charters they were willing to grant — any 
number of them, and containing the most liberal provi- 
sions ; but when it came to engaging the State in the work 
of building these roads, they wisely called a halt. Under 
the circumstances this course, involving, as it did, a cer- 
tain self-denial, was as wise as it was unusual ; and if 
Missouri, during the next few years, escaped a portion of 
the pecuniary troubles that bore so heavily upon some of 
her sister States, it was owing to the conservative spirit 
which then ruled in her legislative councils. 

In the fourteen years that elapsed between 1836 and 
1850, there was a notable growth in the wealth and 



INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS. 285 

population of the State, and with it came a change in 
the opinions of those who had succeeded to the man- 
agement of her finances. To a certain extent, the de- 
parture which now took place from the conservative 
methods that had hitherto prevailed can be justified. 
The State was virtually out of debt ; her revenue had 
largely increased, and granting that it is ever right or 
prudent for a State to engage in a work of internal im- 
provements, or "developing her resources," as enter- 
prises of this kind were called, it is safe to say that the 
time had now come when the people of Missouri could 
afford to indflge in such an undertaking. The trouble, 
however, when a State once embarks in a business of this 
kind, is to find a stopping place. The doors of the public 
treasury having been thrown open, local interests at once 
step in, and as each section of the State has an undoubted 
claim to recognition, it often ends in a general scramble 
for the spoils. Such seems to have been the case in the 
present instance. No sooner was it understood that the 
Missouri Pacific road was to receive a subvention from 
the public purse than there arose the demand for other 
trunk roads, to each of which the State was expected to 
lend assistance. In quick succession the Southwest 
Branch, as the St. Louis and San Francisco was then 
called, the Iron Mountain, and the North Missouri roads 
were chartered ; and in the short space of eight years, 
including the sums voted to the Hannibal and St. Jo- 
seph, these different roads received from the State, 
in the shape of guaranteed bonds, loans amounting, in 
the aggregate, to about twenty-four millions of dollars. 
Upon this sum the roads were expected to pay the 
interest ; but inasmuch as with but one exception they 
failed to do so, the State became bound for the entire 



236 Missouri. 

sum upon which default was made, amounting to some 
twenty millions of dollars. At the time, this was a 
heavy load, especially when supplemented, as it was soon 
afterwards, by the large sums which the State was called 
upon to pay out during the war of the rebellion. How- 
ever, by judicious management and a willingness on the 
part of her citizens to meet these additional expenditures 
by a corresponding increase in the rate of taxation, a 
goodly portion of this debt has already been discharged, 
and the balance, amounting in 1887 to fourteen million 
dollars, has been so placed that it can be met without 
causing any undue hardship. To a great^fcxtent this re- 
sult has been brought about by the very development 
these roads were intended to effect ; and to grieve, there- 
fore, over the amount which they have cost, or which is 
yet due is as idle as would be " the lamentations of a 
boy over the loss of the bait with which he had caught 
the fish.'* 

Simultaneously with the adoption of these plans of in- 
ternal improvement, measures were taken for extending 
and improving the school system of the State and estab- 
lishing it upon a broader financial basis. Hitherto these 
" free schools," as the institutions organized under this 
system were called, depended for their support upon the 
income derived from certain funds which belonged to the 
State, the county, and the township respectively, and 
upon the voluntary contributions of those who were in a 
condition and were willing to avail themselves of the 
advantages which the system offered. The sums re- 
ceived from these several sources were small, that from 
the State amounting in the most prosperous year to less 
than seventy thousand dollars, — a mere drop in the 
bucket when compared with what might have been use- 



EDUCATION. 237 

fully expended. For this reason, and perhaps owing, 
also, in some degree to the sparseness of population and 
to a feeling of prejudice which still lingered in certain 
quarters against the use of schools that were wrongly- 
called " free," the cause of public education was in any- 
thing but a flourishing condition. In some portions 
of the State, especially in the remote and thinly popu- 
lated districts, schoolhouses were necessarily few and far 
apart ; and in those regions where they were more com- 
mon, they were often " nothing more than log huts, un- 
plastered and unceiled, with chimneys constructed of 
sticks, mud, and straw, and without school furniture, un- 
less long, backless benches, made of inverted puncheons, 
and wide planks fastened to the wall for a writing desk, 
can be called furniture." Rude and unsuitable as these 
buildings would now be considered, they were all that 
could then be afforded, and not unfrequently, it is to be 
feared, they were in keeping with the qualifications of 
the teachers and the elementary character of the in- 
struction given. Webster's Speller and Pike's Arithme- 
tic were the text-books in general use, and when a boy 
had "been through " these, and was able to write "fine 
hand," his education, so far as these primitive institu- 
tions were concerned, may be said to have been com- 
pleted. 

Such, in brief, seems to have been the condition of 
public instruction throughout the State of Missouri dur- 
ing the earlier years of her existence. In a few favored 
localities, as for instance in St. Louis and in some of the 
other wealthy and populous counties, a better state of 
affairs might have been found ; but this was the result of 
local causes, and was in nowise due to any action on the 
part of the State, considered as such. Indeed, when re- 



238 Missouri. 

garded from this point of view, it must be confessed that 
Missouri, despite the positive injunctions of her constitu- 
tion to the contrary, had done but little to forward the 
cause of popular education. Even the small sums which, 
from 1842 to 1854, were annually apportioned, for this 
purpose, among the children of the State, were derived 
from a fund, the principal of which she had received, at 
different times, from the general government in the 
shape of gifts in money and land. 

Fortunately, all this was now to be changed. The 
growth of the State in wealth and population, and the 
diversification of interests that had followed in its train, 
made a higher standard of education necessary, and lent 
additional force to the demand which came up for an 
increase in the facilities with which such an education 
was to be obtained. The great mass of the people were 
no longer content with an occasional schoolhouse of logs, 
or with the rudimentary branches in which they had hith- 
erto been instructed ; and although the wisdom of a policy 
which permits any part of the school fund to be " wasted 
in bricks and mortar," or allows one portion of the com- 
munity to be taxed in order to teach another music and 
German, may well be questioned, yet it cannot be denied 
that a long step forward was necessary, if the State was 
to be kept abreast of her neighbors in matters of educa- 
tion. This fact was duly recognized, and at the session 
of 1852-53 the General Assembly passed a law requir- 
ing twenty-five per cent, of the annual revenue of the 
State to be set apart and divided between the different 
counties, according to the number of children of school 
age in each. The first full apportionment under this 
law took place in 1855. "With the exception of the 
seven years between A. d. 1861 and 1867 inclusive, it 



EDUCATION. 239 

has been regularly continued ever since, and so satis- 
factory have been the results produced, that in 1875, 
when a new constitution was adopted, a provision con- 
tinuing and perpetuating this appropriation was made 
part of the organic law, thus fixing, so far as it was pos- 
sible to do so, the policy of the State. 

Liberal as was this provision, it is by no means all 
that the people of Missouri have done for the cause of 
popular education. From various sources the State, 
county, and township funds have been increased, until 
they now amount to ten million five hundred thousand 
dollars, a good part of which is invested in the bonds of 
the State. The interest upon this sum is all that can 
be used, but it has reached an amount which, added to 
the annual appropriation and to the receipts from tuition 
fees and the voluntarily imposed local taxes, swelled the 
grand total, for the year ending June 30, 1886, to the 
magnificent proportions of five millions of dollars. 

In disposing of these amounts as from year to year 
they became available, care has been taken to add to 
the number of primary as distinguished from high 
schools, experience having shown that they are rela- 
tively of greater importance, owing to the number of 
pupils who attend them and do not advance any farther. 
Institutions for dispensing a higher education, however, 
are by no means ignored. " In the larger cities and 
towns, and in many of the smaller towns and villages, 
prosperous graded schools are maintained for eight, nine, 
or ten months in the year ; and nearly all support a 
high school," with a curriculum extending through two, 
three, or four years. Besides these institutions of a 
higher class, there are in the State four normal schools, 
one of which is intended to furnish teachers for the 



240 MISSOURI. 

colored schools, and a State University, to which are 
attached a school of mines and an agricultural and 
mechanical department. To the support of all these 
the State contributes liberally, the amount of each ap- 
propriation varying with the necessities of the case. Of 
the benevolent institutions, the asylums for the blind, 
the deaf and dumb, and the insane, it is unnecessary to 
speak at length. In number and thoroughness of equip- 
ment they have kept pace with the demands of the time, 
and they are maintained upon a scale of liberality be- 
fitting the State. 



CHAPTER XII. 

KANSAS TROUBLES : PROGRESS OF THE STATE : 
ELECTION OF I860. 

From considerations of this pleasant and peaceful 
character, the people of Missouri were recalled by the 
adoption, in May, 1854, of the Kansas bill and the 
struggle to which it gave rise between freedom and slav- 
ery for the possession of that fair land. As has already 
been intimated, the region which it was proposed, under 
this act, to organize into a territory, was a part of the 
Louisiana Purchase, and as it was situated north of 
the line of thirty-six degrees and thirty minutes north 
latitude, it of course came within the limits within which 
slavery was prohibited by the terms of the Missouri 
Compromise. This measure, it was then contended, was 
no longer binding, having been superseded by the com- 
promise of 1850 ; and that there might be no doubt as 
to the opinion of Congress upon this point, a clause was 
inserted into the Kansas bill, by virtue of which the 
Missouri Compromise was expressly repealed, and the 
people of the newly organized territory were left to de- 
cide whether they would or would not sanction the exist- 
ence of slavery within its limits, just as had lately been 
done in the cases of New Mexico and Utah, and as had 
been the custom in the early days of the Republic. 

To any one not wedded to an idea, or not blinded by 



242 Missouri. 

political prejudices, this return to the policy of the 
fathers seems like a fair and equitable settlement of the 
question. The Missouri Compromise had been tried and 
found wanting, and in abrogating it, as it undoubtedly 
had the right to do, Congress not only performed a 
tardy act of justice to the South, but it anticipated by 
some three years the decision of the supreme court, 
which pronounced this same compromise to be uncon- 
stitutional, and therefore null and void. In taking this 
action, then, Congress certainly gave no grounds for sup- 
posing that it was actuated by a wish to legislate slavery 
into the territory, neither, on the other hand, did it 
show any evidence of an intention to exclude it there- 
from ; but in throwing open this region to settlement by 
the people alike of the slave and free States, and declar- 
ing that its object in so doing was to leave them " per- 
fectly free to form and regulate their domestic institu- 
tions in their own way, subject only to the Constitution 
of the United States," it furnished the best possible 
proof of its desire to eliminate, as far as it could be 
done, " the dangerous and exciting question of slavery " 
from the field of national legislation, and confine it to 
the people who were directly interested in solving it. 
That such would have been the result if the settlement 
of the territory had been permitted to go forward in 
the usual way, without any outside interference, there is 
every reason to believe ; but the experiment was never 
tried, owing to the course which the anti-slavery faction 
of the North now thought proper to pursue. They 
were determined to prevent the formation of any more 
slave States ; and to this end they began, even before the 
Kansas bill became a law, the organization of Emigrant 
Aid companies, the object of which was to flood the 



KANSAS TROUBLES. 243 

territory with voters * who should control it in the inter- 
est of freedom. In this they ultimately succeeded ; and 
whilst it is not possible to approve of the revolutionary 
measures to which they and their agents in Kansas were 
obliged to resort in order to effect this purpose, yet there 
are, to-day, but few who will regret the result. 

As might have been expected this course added not a 
little to the excitement which the discussion of the ques- 
tion of slavery in the territories had created among the 
people of the Southern States. They regarded it as an 
effort on the part of the North to evade the evident spirit 
and intent of the law, and it led to the formation of coun- 
ter associations and " blue lodges," which were intended 
to perform in behalf of slavery the same kind of work 
that was expected of the aid societies in the cause of 
freedom. Especially was this the case in Missouri, which, 
being coterminous along its western border with the new 
territory, was supposed to be in a position to be more 
seriously affected by the result than was any other por- 
tion of the South. Evidently, if Kansas were to be- 
come a free State it would make of Missouri a huge 

1 The character of much of this emigration may he gathered 
from the fact that " the Kansas societies, leagues, and committees 
. . sent out men only," and that in some of their hands Sharps' 
rifles were more numerous than agricultural implements. Min- 
ing camps, we may remark, are peopled on this principle, but 
bond fide settlers in a farming country do not emigrate in this 
one-sided fashion, — a truth of which the Hon. Eli Thayer seems 
to have caught a glimpse, when he tells us that " when the Mis- 
sourians went into Kansas to settle, they took their families with 
them." So far as the Blue Lodges of Missouri and the Emi- 
grant Aid companies of Massachusetts were concerned, their ob- 
ject was the same and their methods identical. The only differ- 
ence was that the Missourians were more open and above-board 
in their efforts to capture the State. 



244 Missouri. 

slave peninsula jutting up into free territory, and it was 
assumed, whether rightly or wrongly it matters not, that 
this fact would lessen, if it did not practically destroy, 
the value of the slaves owned in the State, by rendering 
their possession insecure. At this time, Missouri con- 
tained, on a rough calculation, about one hundred thou- 
sand of these unfortunate people, worth, perhaps, some 
thirty-five millions of dollars. Probably one half of 
this number were to be found in the western half of 
the State ; and though there was no reason to suppose 
that they would escape into Kansas any more than they 
had done into Illinois, Iowa, or the Indian country, yet 
the possibility of such a contingency, and the feeling of 
alarm which it created as to the safety of this kind of 
property, were seized upon by the small but active band 
of slavery propagandists who lived in the State, and 
made to do duty as a reason why those who wished to 
preserve the " peculiar institution " should cross the 
border and endeavor to fasten it upon Kansas. " If," 
said Senator Atchison, on the eve of the territorial elec- 
tion in November, 1854, " a set of fanatics and dema- 
gogues, a thousand miles off, can afford to advance their 
money and exert every nerve to abolitionize the territory 
and exclude the slaveholders when they have not the 
least personal interest " in so doing, how much more is 
it the duty of those who live within a day's journey of 
the territory, and whose peace, quiet, and property de- 
pend on the result, to meet and counteract these efforts 
by sending some hundreds of their young men over the 
border to vote for their institutions. " Should each 
county in the State only do its duty," the question, he 
thought, " would be decided quietly and peaceably at 
the ballot-box ; " but if they failed and the territory 



KANSAS TROUBLES. 245 

was lost to slavery, then, he added, "Missouri and the 
other Southern States would have shown themselves rec- 
reant to their interests and would deserve their fate." 

From a Southern point of view, this is perhaps as 
strong a statement of the case as can be made, though 
it is in the nature of a tu quoque argument, and cannot 
be considered as justifying the course of the pro-slavery 
men, so far as this can be shown to have been contrary 
to law. It is well, however, when condemning crimes 
against the ballot-box, no matter by whom committed, to 
remember that in a newly organized territory the con- 
ditions of citizenship are different from those that pre- 
vail in old established communities. Tomahawk claims 
and such like devices, according to the unwritten law 
of the frontier, have always been held to convey cer- 
tain rights as to property, and inferentially as to citizen- 
ship ; and bearing this fact in mind, and having due 
regard for the saving effect of a few days' presence in 
the territory, it must often have been a difficult mat- 
ter to know whether a given person was or was not a 
citizen within the purview of the law. Certainly, if 
a company of so-called northern emigrants, in which 
there were two hundred and twenty-five men and only 
five women, whose " wagons contained no visible furni- 
ture, agricultural implements or mechanical tools," but 
" abounded in all the requisite articles for camping and 
campaigning purposes," were considered as bond fide 
settlers and permitted to vote, there could not have been 
a sufficient reason for ruling out any band of Missourians 
who ever crossed the border and declared their inten- 
tion of remaining, even though they left the next day. 

Another consideration, but of a purely political nature, 
and having for its object the restoration of the equilib- 



246 Missouri. 

rium between the free and slave States which had been 
disturbed by the admission of California, was not with- 
out its weight. Its influence, it is true, was but limited, 
for, as yet, the circle of those who recognized the full 
significance of the struggle for the possession of Kansas 
was small. To the great mass of the American people, 
North as well as South, it was a mere incident in the 
contest for political power which had been going on for 
fifty years and more ; and like all former incidents of 
the same kind, it was regarded as important only so far 
as it might give a temporary advantage to one or the 
other of the political parties into which the country 
was divided. To shrewd, far-seeing politicians like 
Senator Atchinson and B. F. Stringfellow, it meant 
much more. They saw in it the last peaceful struggle 
that the South could make upon this issue, with any 
prospect of success ; for they knew, as only one " to the 
manner born " could know, that upon the result in Kan- 
sas depended not only the future of New Mexico and 
Utah, but also of all the rest of that vast region which 
the repeal of the Missouri Compromise had thrown open 
to the Southern slaveholder upon the same terms as 
those upon which it was open to the Northern f ree-soiler. 
If, with all the advantages which the proximity of Mis- 
souri to Kansas gave them, they could not secure that 
territory to their interest, it needed no prophet to tell 
them that the prize for which they had so long con- 
tended was lost ; that as parties were then constituted, 
the struggle for political supremacy was ended ; and that 
hereafter, so far as slavery was concerned, they would 
have to fight not for its extension into new territories, 
but for its existence even in those States in which it had 
the sanction of law. 



KANSAS TROUBLES. 247 

Powerful as these considerations must have been 
with a certain class, and influential as that class con- 
fessedly was, by reason of its wealth and intelligence, 
they do not enable us to account for the number and 
political complexion of the Missourians who crossed 
over into Kansas during the year or two succeeding its 
organization as a territory, and in good faith sought to 
make a home there. To do this we shall have to trust 
to an entirely different order of facts, — to one that is 
not only disconnected with the question of slavery, but 
which is at once general in its application and immedi- 
ate in its effects. Thus, for instance, assuming with the 
census of February, 1855, that the number of qualified 
voters then in the territory (a majority of whom are ad- 
mitted to have been of Southern birth) was about three 
thousand, it is probably safe to say that from one third 
to one half of them had come from Missouri, though 
they may not all have been natives of that State. They 
were not slaveholders, or if they were, they evidently 
had not taken their slaves with them, for to have done 
so would have been to incur the very risk which, as 
owners of this kind of property, they were anxious to 
avoid ; but they were, as a class, small farmers, — men 
who were not above the necessity of doing their own 
work with their own hands, though with a genuine An- 
glo-Saxon greed for land, they either owned or expected 
to own the farms upon which they lived. To state the 
character of the emigration in this fashion is to suggest 
the motives of those who took part in it. Obviously, 
their object was none other than that which had led 
their fathers across the Mississippi ; and to any one 
familiar with frontier life, it is needless to say that this 
was the very general though somewhat prosaic desire of 



248 Missouri. 

improving their condition. In the older communities, 
much of the desirable farming land had been taken up, 
and was either in cultivation, or held for speculation; 
whilst Kansas was, as yet, a virgin field, a sort of prom- 
ised land, where farms could be had at government 
prices, and the range was practically boundless. Con- 
siderations of this character have ever been irresistible 
with a certain class of borderers, and tempted by them 
now, numbers of Missouri farmers, following in the foot- 
steps of their fathers, joined the long caravan of movers, 
and pitched their tents a day's march farther west. 

Not being slave-owners even in the restricted sense 
in which that term was used in the border States, they 
cannot be accused of having any direct pecuniary inter- 
est in the extension of the " peculiar institution " to their 
new home. In fact, upon economic grounds it would 
seem as if they ought to have been the natural political 
allies of the free-State men ; and yet such had been the 
effect produced by the agitation of the slavery question, 
and the short-sighted action of the more violent among 
the Northern abolitionists in running off slaves and abus- 
ing all who were interested in the institution, even those 
who only tolerated it, that they were, as a rule, changed 
from possible friends to actual enemies. From their 
ranks came not a few of those who were most deter- 
mined to make Kansas in all respects like Missouri. 

Of the details of the struggle which took place when 
these two opposing currents met it is not necessary to 
speak. That task has been committed to another hand, 
and from the account which Mr. Spring 1 has given of 
those stirring times, it is evident that the sins were not all 
on the side of those who wished to make Kansas a slave 
1 See Kansas, in "American Common wealths," by L. W. Spring. 



KANSAS TROUBLES. 249 

State. To any one conversant with the facts, this as- 
surance is not necessary, and yet so generally and per- 
sistently have the occurrences of this period been mis- 
represented that it may not be out of place to intimate 
that if all that was ever charged against the so-called 
border ruffians in the way of illegal voting be admitted, 
it would not justify the course which the friends of free- 
dom thought proper to pursue at this juncture. The 
remedy for the evils of which they complained was to be 
found at the ballot-box, and not in revolution. Without 
going into the particulars of this long and bloody strug- 
gle, it will be sufficient for my purpose to state that 
whilst, as a matter of fact, both parties were engaged in 
the disreputable business of colonizing the territory with 
voters, the legality of the first election — the one held 
in November, 1854 — was not only not contested, but 
the pro-slavery delegate to Congress, then chosen, was 
permitted to take and hold his seat without opposition. 
At the next election, in March, 1855, things were very 
different. It was attended with more or less violence 
and intimidation, and there seems to be no doubt that, 
in this case, the Missourians or pro-slavery men were 
the chief, but not the only sinners. At all events they 
polled the most votes, more it is said than there were 
voters in the territory, and elected an overwhelming 
majority of their candidates to the territorial legislature, 
even after ruling out the six whose seats were contested, 
and two others, against whose election there was no pro- 
test, but to whom Governor Reeder also refused certif- 
icates. This purgation, sweeping as it was, did not 
satisfy the free-State men. On second thoughts, and 
for obvious reasons, they now wished the whole election 
to be set aside ; but to this neither the territorial au- 



250 MISSOURI. 

thorities nor Congress were willing to accede. 1 Fail- 
ing in their efforts to bring this about, the anti-slavery 
party set up an opposition legislature, and endeavored, 
by force and usurpation, to overthrow the government 
which had been regularly established over them. In 
taking this course, instead of submitting their cause to 
the arbitrament of the ballot-box, they not only gave 
good grounds for doubting the truth of their oft-repeated 
statement as to the preponderance of population in 
their favor, but they placed themselves outside of the 
law, and therefore clearly and hopelessly in the wrong. 
Had they succeeded, it would have resulted, as Presi- 
dent Buchanan well and truly said, in establishing a 
revolutionary government in place of the one " pre- 
scribed and recognized by Congress," 2 and would have 
been " a usurpation of the same character as it would 
be if a portion of the people of a State were to under- 
take to establish a separate government within its char- 
tered limits, for the purpose of redressing any grievance, 
real or imaginary," of which they thought they had a 
right to complain. " Such a principle," he added, " if 
carried into execution, would destroy all lawful author- 
ity and produce universal anarchy," and yet, new as the 
fact may be to some of us, this is precisely what the 
free-State men of Kansas and their friends and allies in 
the North tried to accomplish. 

1 . . . At the time I entered upon my official duties ' ' (March 
1857), " Congress had recognized this legislature in different forms 
and hy different enactments. The delegate elected to the House 
of Representatives, under a territorial law, had just completed 
his term of service on the day previous to my inauguration. In 
fact, I found the government of Kansas as well established as that 
of any other territory.' ' — Buchanan' 's Administration, p. 31. New 
York, 1866. 

2 Buchanan' 's Administration, chapter ii. New York, 1866. 



KANSAS TROUBLES. 251 

With such a beginning, it was inevitable that evil 
should follow. The difficulty, not to say impossibility, 
of enforcing the processes of the courts, United States 
as well as territorial, in Lawrence and other portions 
of the territory where the friends of freedom held sway, 
naturally gave rise to an era of lawlessness ; and in the 
saturnalia that then prevailed, the " jayhawkers," as 
those who took to robbery in the interest of anti-slavery 
were called, are said to have been " the superior devils." l 
In the long list of crimes attributed to them, illegal vot- 
ing, the one offense of which the free-State men com- 
plained most bitterly, and which it was therefore natural 
to suppose they would have avoided, certainly holds a 
place ; and it was reserved for John Brown to inaugurate 
the system of murder for opinion's sake, by the assassi- 
nation of five peaceable settlers on the Pottowatamie, ap- 
parently for no better reason than because they differed 
from him upon the question of slavery, and he thought 
an example necessary. 2 

1 Kansas, by Leverett W. Spring, p. 256. Boston, 1885. 

2 "Measured by the scale of the tinies, the five squatters on 
whom he laid a tiger's paw were not exceptionally bad men." — 
Spring's Kansas, p. 147. " I became satisfied from new and con- 
clusive evidence that these men were innocent of all crime or 
threatened crime, and that their taking off was not intended for 
the protection of free-State men from their outrages and such as 
theirs, but was intended by Brown as an act of offensive war." — 
Governor Charles Robinson, in a letter dated Lawrence, July 22, 
1884, and published in the Boston Transcript of August 15th. 
Any one desirous of further information upon this point, or as to 
Brown's career in Kansas, will do well to consult Reminiscences of 
Old John Brown, a pamphlet published at Rockford, 111., in 1880. 
The author, Dr. George W. Brown, was the editor of the Kansas 
Herald of Freedom, and one of the most active men of that time 
on that side. The Life of John Brown, by F. B. Sanborn, may 
also be read to advantage. 



252 Missouri. 

During all these troublous years, it is a noteworthy 
fact that the pro-slavery men of the territory, what- 
ever may have been their sins as individuals, were, as 
a party, uniformly to be found supporting the govern- 
ment. 1 Even upon those occasions when, reinforced by 
their friends and neighbors from Missouri, they are said 
to have invested, or beleaguered, or sacked Lawrence, 
they were serving as a posse comitatus, summoned by 
the regularly constituted authorities of the territory 2 to 
aid in enforcing the laws. 

With Kansas in a state of anarchy, it was impossible 
that the people in the adjoining counties of Missouri 
should not suffer. Compared with their neighbors on 
the other side of the border, they were old settlers, and 
as they had accumulated more or less property they of 
course had something to lose, which is more than can be 
truthfully said of most of the new-comers. This fact 
the " jayhawkers " were not slow to learn, and as they 
cared as little for state lines as they did for law, they 
soon began their freebooting inroads into the more 
thinly populated counties south of the Missouri, taking 
whatever they could conveniently carry off. One of 
these raids was headed by John Brown, and it is memo- 
rable as being his last appearance in Kansas affairs. It 
took place in December, 1858, and resulted in the de- 
struction of considerable property, the liberation of eleven 
slaves, and the death, but not by the hands of Brown's 
immediate party, of a slave-owner, who seems to have ob- 

1 " Whilst the pro-slavery party in the territory sustained the 
government in all its branches which had been established over it 
by Congress, the anti-slavery party repudiated it." — Buchanan 1 s 
Administration, p. 29. New York, 1866. 

2 Spring's Kansas, pp. 91, 118, 189, 197; Sanborn's Life of 
John Brown, pp. 216, 234. 



KANSAS TROUBLES. 253 

jected to the way in which it was proposed to dispossess 
him of his property. This raid, coming as it did soon 
after the joint attempt of the governors of Missouri and 
Kansas to bring about a pacification of the frontier, 
created great excitement in the former State, where it 
was made the basis of legislative action at the meeting 
of the General Assembly, which took place in the Janu- 
ary following. During the course of that session, Gov- 
ernor Stewart sent in several messages, in which he 
called attention to this outrage and urged that measures 
be taken to protect the people of that portion of the State 
from further trouble. Accompanying one of these mes- 
sages were memorials from thirty-five citizens of Bates 
and Vernon counties, in which they gave accounts of 
crimes that had been perpetrated in their neighborhoods 
by organized bands of robbers from Kansas, and asked 
that a sufficient force be sent to the border to defend 
" peaceable and law-abiding citizens from insult, outrage, 
and lawless violence." 

In accordance with this request, a bill was prepared 
and introduced into the Senate, where it was favorably 
received. When the measure came up in the House, 
it was referred to the committee on federal relations, 
and in due time it elicited from that body a report, 
which is well described by a recent writer as being a 
" singularly dispassionate and sensible document." In 
it, the committee, after referring to the delicate relations 
that must exist between States which are separated only by 
an imaginary line, and to the fact that the borders of 
counties, so separated, are the favorite resorts of banditti 
and desperadoes, go on to say : — 

"We do not doubt that at least ninety-nine out of 
every hundred of the citizens of Kansas deplore the 



254 Missouri. 

events under consideration. . . . The people of Kansas 
and Missouri are most intimately connected, not only by 
geographical lines, but by the tender cords of kindred. 
We are the same people, impelled by the same interest, 
and bound by the same manifest destiny. . . . Even if 
this difficulty be winked at by Kansas ... we would 
earnestly recommend the trial of every honorable means 
of reconciliation before a resort to extreme measures. 
... If ... an army be stationed along the line of our 
frontier for the avowed purpose of protecting our border 
from incursions from a neighboring territory . . . Mis- 
souri . . . might well expect other States on our border 
to act on the line of the same suicidal policy . . . and 
the fraternal feeling that is not now circumscribed by 
state lines, would be rent asunder, and we would meet 
our brothers from our sister States as aliens and 
enemies." 

" This bill," it was further objected, " provides that 
these troops are to be raised from the counties on the 
border ; taken from the midst of a people already exas- 
perated by the murder and robbing of their kindred and 
neighbors. Companies formed out of such material 
would be hard to restrain from acts of summary pun- 
ishment, should any of these desperadoes fall into their 
hands ; and it would likewise be difficult to teach 
such troops the line of our jurisdiction, and, in the ex- 
citement of inflicting a merited punishment on some 
offender, it would be hard for them to comprehend the 
deplorable evils attending an armed invasion of a sis- 
ter territory by the militia of a State. . . . Your com- 
mittee," it is added, "are not insensible of the obli- 
gations of the State to protect all her citizens, . . . 
but ... we are most unwilling that the State should 



KANSAS TROUBLES. 255 

run wild in the remedies applied We have evidence of 
the most satisfactory character that outrages, almost 
without a parallel in America, at least, have been per- 
petrated upon the persons and property of unoffending 
citizens of Bates and Vernon counties, — their houses 
plundered and then burned, their negroes kidnapped in 
droves, citizens wounded and murdered in cold blood, 
— which evils demand at our hands the best remedy the 
wisdom of the legislature can apply." In conclusion, 
they decline to recommend the use of a military force, 
but they advise that rewards should be offered for the 
arrest of the jayhawking leaders, and that circuit judges 
should hold special terms in the disturbed districts, for 
the purpose of investigating grievances and adopting 
measures for the arrest of all offenders. A bill to this 
effect was accordingly passed ; and by way of affording 
additional security to the people of the threatened coun- 
ties, the governor was authorized to use his discretion 
in the adoption of such measures as he might deem nec- 
essary for their protection, and a special appropriation 
of thirty thousand dollars was made to enable him to 
carry out this purpose. In accordance with this law, a re- 
ward of three thousand dollars was offered for the arrest 
of Brown, but it was of no avail. He succeeded in pilot- 
ing his little band of fugitive slaves to a place of safety 
in Canada, and then returned to Ohio, where he sold the 
horses he had stolen, though we are told, with what may 
be an attempt at humor, that he " warned the purchasers 
of a possible defect in the title." 1 

With this successful foray, John Brown's career in 
Kansas and on the border came to an end. On each 
of his visits to the territory, his path had been marked 

1 Sanborn's Life of John Brown, p. 494. 



256 Missouri. 

with blood ; and yet, except in the little town of Tabor, 
Iowa, which had been one of his favorite haunts when 
Kansas became " too hot to hold him," his course does not 
appear to have called forth a word of protest from his 
Northern admirers. Instead of meting out to him the 
treatment due to a monomaniac or a fugitive from jus- 
tice, they received him as a sort of popular hero. His 
murders were either denied or justified ; the attempts 
which he and his friends successfully made to resist ar- 
rest were characterized as battles, and philanthropic 
gentlemen were found in Boston and elsewhere, who did 
not hesitate to supply him with " material aid," though 
they must have known that in the schemes in which he 
was engaged, robbery certainly, and probably murder, 
were essential to success. In their sympathy for "bleed- 
ing " Kansas — made so by crimes for which they were 
largely responsible — they seem to have forgotten that 
even in as good a cause as a crusade to prevent the for- 
mation of another slave State, the end did not justify the 
means. 1 

For some time after this action of the Missouri offi- 
cials, and in consequence, also, of the exertions of the 
federal and territorial authorities, a condition of com- 
parative peace was established on the frontier. It did 

1 Some idea of the state of feeling- that prevailed in certain 
quarters may be inferred from the following- statement of Mr. 
F. B. Sanborn, published in the Boston Transcriirt of December 
6, 1884: " I myself beard a Massachusetts man, high in the con- 
fidence of Mr. Lawrence, propose (in the rooms of the Emigrant 
Aid Company in Winter Street, Boston, a few days after Buchan- 
an's election, November, 1856), that men should be sent out to 
dispatch Stringf ellow and Atchison, leaders of the border ruffians 
in Missouri. No one responded to the suggestion, but it was 
seriously made". ' ' 



KANSAS TROUBLES. 257 

not last long, as the decline of guerilla life was apparent 
rather than real. In November, 1860, another outbreak 
occurred, in which the United States court for the third 
Kansas district was broken up by a band of " jay hawk- 
ers," under the lead of Montgomery, and the United 
States officers, including the judge himself, "were obliged 
to fly for their lives." A grand juror by the name of 
Moore was murdered, as were Samuel Scott and Rus- 
sell Hindes, the latter a citizen of Missouri. 

The crime of which they were accused, according to 
a paper found in Hindes' pocket after death, consisted 
in being engaged (in) hunting and kidnapping negroes 
in 1859. In other words, they were hung because they 
had aided in capturing a runaway slave, as it was clearly 
their right to do under a law which, however objection- 
able in some of its features, did not differ in its end and 
aim from one that had been passed in 1793, and had re- 
ceived the approving signature of Washington himself. 
Naturally enough these proceedings caused much alarm 
along the border, and more particularly as they were 
indorsed by a so-called convention of Linn and Bour- 
bon counties, Kansas, and were backed by the declara- 
tion of Montgomery that he intended " to keep posses- 
sion of Fort Scott and other places near the state line, 
to prevent ' a fire in the rear,' while he cleaned out 
southern Missouri of its slaves." * 

When the report of these proceedings, somewhat ex- 
aggerated, perhaps, so far as it related to the invasion 

1 Our authority, Judge Williams of the United States District 
Court, adds that ' ' so far, he has carried out literally his declared 
programme," and "the citizens of Missouri on the Osage, Mar- 
maton, and in Bates and Vernon, are flying from their homes 
into the interior." 



258 Missouri. 

of the State, reached Jefferson City, Governor Stewart 
ordered Brigadier-General D. M. Frost to proceed at 
once to the border with men enough to end the difficulty. 
This order reached St. Louis on the 23d of November, 
1860, and in less than forty-eight hours a force of six hun- 
dred and thirty men was on the way to the scene of the 
out-break. Upon reaching the frontier, which they did 
early in December, they found that General Harney of 
the regular army had already arrived at Fort Scott ; and 
when Montgomery saw himself threatened by both fed- 
eral and state troops, he abandoned his fort, disbanded 
his men, and temporarily left the county. In a report 
made after his return to St. Louis, General Frost sub- 
mitted a number of affidavits, from which it appears 
that " Hindes was taken from the midst of an indigent 
and dependent family . . . and hanged to death for no 
other crime, than that he had been faithful to the laws 
and institutions of his State." General Frost further 
states " that the deserted and charred remains of once 
happy homes, combined with the general terror that 
prevailed amongst the citizens who still clung to their 
possessions, gave but too certain proof of the persecution 
to which they had all been subjected, and which they 
would again have to endure, with renewed violence, so 
soon as armed protection should be withdrawn." In 
view of this condition of affairs, and in order to carry 
out fully Governor Stewart's order " to repel invasions 
and restore peace to the border," Frost determined to 
leave a considerable force in the threatened district. 
Accordingly, a battalion of volunteers, consisting of 
three companies of rangers and one of artillery, was 
enlisted, and Lieutenant-Colonel John S. Bowen, who 
afterwards rose to high rank in the Confederate service, 
was chosen to the command. 



PROGRESS OF THE STATE. 259 

With the organization of this force, and perhaps 
owing also, in some degree, to the inclemency of the 
season, " jayhawking," as such, came to an end, though 
the thing itself, during the first two or three years of 
the civil war, and, in fact, as long as there was anything 
left on the Missouri side of the border worth taking, flour- 
ished more vigorously than ever. The old jayhawking 
leaders, however, now came with United States commis- 
sions in their pockets and at the head of regularly en- 
listed troops, in which guise they carried on a system of 
robbery and murder that left a good portion of the 
frontier south of the Missouri River as perfect a waste 
as Germany was at the end of the Thirty Years' War. 

Notwithstanding the condition of semi-hostility that 
prevailed upon her western border during a great part 
of the time, the progress of Missouri in wealth and 
population during the ten years that intervened between 
1850 and 1860 was satisfactory. From being the thir- 
teenth in the sisterhood of States, in point of numbers, 
she had grown to be the eighth, and in this respect, at 
least, she was at the head of the Southern States. In 
other words, she now had within her borders a popula- 
tion of one million one hundred and eighty-two thou- 
sand as against six hundred and eighty-two thousand 
in 1850 ; a rate of increase, we may remark in pass- 
ing, which is hardly reconcilable with the theory that 
emigration always shunned the regions where slavery 
existed. Of this whole population one hundred and fif- 
teen thousand were slaves, about twenty-seven thousand 
more than were reported in the census of 1850. As- 
suming these two enumerations to have been correct, it 
will give an increase of about thirty-one per cent, for 
the ten years, a fraction over three per cent, per an- 



260 MISSOURI. 

nam, only about one third the rate at which the whites 
had advanced during the same period. Under the cir- 
cumstances this increase in the number of blacks is a 
noteworthy fact, not so much on account of the per- 
centage of growth which it indicates, as for the insight 
which it gives us into the condition of public opinion 
in the State. Thus, for instance, if we compare this 
rate of increase with the progress in numbers made 
by this ill-fated people during the several decades that 
had elapsed since the organization of Missouri as a ter- 
ritory, it will be seen that there is a marked falling 
off. This has been construed, and no doubt correctly, 
as foreshadowing the fate that would ultimately have 
befallen the " peculiar institution " if it had been left to 
the action of natural causes. It may even be taken 
as an indication that the process of its gradual extinc- 
tion in the State was already well under way ; but if, 
on the other hand, we limit ourselves to the considera- 
tion of the actual increase in the number of slaves dur- 
ing this interval, without reference to any previous period, 
it will be found to suggest a different order of facts. 
Viewed in this light, it tells us in no doubtful terms 
that, up to this time, but few of these people had been 
sent South, as they would have been if such a course had 
been deemed necessary to their retention as slaves, and 
it justifies the inference that the great mass of the 
people of the State still looked forward to a peaceable 
solution of the difficulties between the North and the 
South, which now began to take a most portentous shape. 
Another fact of much economic and, as we shall see 
later on, of no little political importance that may be 
gathered from a study of the census returns is to be 
found in the number of foreign-born emigrants that 



PROGRESS OF THE STATE. 2G1 

were then in the State. According to the reports of 
1860, they amounted to one hundred and sixty thousand 
— almost a seventh of the entire population ; and of 
this number eighty-eight thousand were Germans, whilst 
the Irish, who came next, had but forty-three thousand. 
The revolutions of 1848 and the unsettled condition of 
continental Europe for some years afterwards, taken in 
connection with the failure of the potato crops in 1846-47 
and the consequent famine in Ireland, will no doubt ac- 
count for much of the emigration that took place dur- 
ing this period ; and when once these new-comers had 
landed on our shores, the central position and temperate 
climate, to say nothing of the agricultural and commer- 
cial advantages which Missouri held out to those in 
search of a home and a livelihood, will go far towards 
explaining the favor with which the State was generally 
regarded. Although not in receipt of the heaviest con- 
tingent of these new arrivals, yet she had no reason to 
be dissatisfied with the number or character of those of 
them who found homes within her hospitable borders. 
Compared with Ohio, Illinois, or even Wisconsin, she 
certainly lagged behind, but among the other States of 
the West and Northwest she was easily first. 

Contrary to the practice of immigrants generally, a 
number of these new-comers, especially among the Ger- 
mans, turned their attention to farming and market- 
gardening, and established themselves on small hold- 
ings near the cities and towns ; or else, going into the 
country, they might have been found on little farms, and 
usually in isolated communities, whole townships in por- 
tions of the State being taken up with their settlements. 
Being industrious and frugal, they soon came to own 
the farms on which they lived, and were thus pecu- 



262 Missouri. 

niarily independent. To this extent, and so far as 
they proved themselves to be law-abiding and, when the 
crisis came, patriotic, they may be said to have been a 
valuable addition to the population. From a political 
point of view, however, it may well be questioned 
whether they did not show themselves to be possessed of 
certain characteristics which made them less desirable 
as citizens than were the emigrants from other portions 
of Europe, who were not gifted with their prudent fore- 
sight, but who were more easily assimilated. Leading 
the isolated lives they did, they were not open to out- 
side influences, and this, of course, had a tendency to 
keep them separate and apart from the rest of the com- 
munity, and it also aggravated the natural tenacity with 
which they clung to the language, the manners and cus- 
toms, and habits of thought which they brought from 
the " fatherland." Indeed, they may be said to have 
had in an eminent degree, as they still have, the defects 
of their virtues. The very strength of race which has 
made the Anglo-Saxon the virtual owner of a large part 
of the habitable globe, and which he inherited from his 
German ancestors, may upon occasion prove a source of 
discord and an element of danger in so far as it pre- 
vents the German emigrant of to-day from becoming 
thoroughly and speedily Americanized. 

Great as was the progress of the State in population, 
it was more than equaled by her increase in wealth. 
According to the official reports, the estimated value of 
the property, real and personal, for the year 1860 was 
$501,214,398 as against $137,247,707 in 1850, an in- 
crease of about 265 per cent. This is believed to be 
too great, as the valuation of 1850 was low ; but even 
if we add to that estimate fifty millions of dollars, it 



PROGRESS OF THE STATE. 263 

will still give very satisfactory results. Of the whole 
amount, the farms are put down as being worth some 
two hundred and thirty millions, and this is probably 
not far from their actual value, as, up to that date, 
twenty-one millions of acres had been taken up, over 
six millions of which were in cultivation. On the other 
hand, the manufactured products were estimated at only 
about forty-two millions of dollars, the original plants, 
or capital invested, being rated at half that sum. 

Of this latter amount but a small fraction was em- 
ployed in mining and kindred pursuits, though the geo- 
logical survey of the State had shown that her stores of 
mineral wealth were practically inexhaustible, and that 
they were so situated with reference to each other and 
to a market as to promise favorable returns upon any 
efforts that might be made to develop them. This sur- 
vey, it is true, was not yet finished, but enough had 
been done to show that of the sixty-nine thousand 
square miles composing the total area of the State, 
fourteen thousand were underlaid by workable beds of 
coal ; that more than one thousand valuable veins of 
lead, and half as many of iron, had been discovered and 
partly traced, besides many of zinc, copper, hydraulic 
limestones, and mineral paints. 

It had also been demonstrated that " that portion of 
the State south of the Osage River, once considered by 
the superficial observer as almost worthless, has a soil 
(rocky and broken as it is) and a climate wonderfully 
adapted to the grape and other valuable fruits." Of 
the forty -four millions of acres of land in the State, 
there were only about three millions, and these mainly 
in the swamp region of the southeast, that did not 
promise plenteous returns to careful and intelligent hus- 



264 Missouri. 

bandry. All the grains, grasses, fruits, and vegetables 
that are adapted to a fertile soil and temperate climate, 
to say nothing of such products as tobacco, hemp, and 
even cotton, were cultivated to advantage ; and upon 
the broad prairies and in the fertile valleys of tbe State 
countless herds and droves of domestic animals found 
abundant food and shelter. 

Such, in fine, was the condition of Missouri on the 
31st of December, 1860, when the twenty-first General 
Assembly of the State began its first session at Jefferson 
City. This body, consisting in the Senate of twenty- 
five Democrats, seven Bell-Everett (Compromise Union) 
men, and one Republican, and, in the House, of eighty- 
three Democrats, thirty-seven Bell-Everett men, and 
twelve Republicans, had been chosen at the election 
which took place in the preceding August ; and, speak- 
ing without reference to the question of secession, it 
may be said to have been fairly representative of the 
political parties in the State as they had shown them- 
selves to be at the presidential election in November of 
that year. Of the 165,000 votes then cast, Lincoln re- 
ceived 17,028; Bell and Everett, 58,372; and the 
Democrats had tbe rest. Their vote, however, was di- 
vided between Breckinridge and Douglas, the former of 
whom received 31,317 votes, whilst the latter, with a fol- 
lowing of 58,801, obtained the electoral vote of the State. 
In attempting to carry our classification still further, and 
distinguish between the two wings of the Democratic 
party, the Breckinridge men, or rather those who after- 
wards became such (for at the time of their election 
this issue was not sharply drawn), may be set down as 
being States' rights men, and there can be no doubt 
that, when the time came for a decision, the leaders 



ELECTION OF 1860. 265 

amongst them, and not a few of the rank and file, cast 
their lot in with the South ; but to speak of them as 
being secessionists, meaning thereby that they were in 
favor of an immediate dissolution of the Union at any 
and every cost, would be gross injustice. Probably at 
this time, although it was ten days after South Carolina 
had seceded, there was not a handful of people in the 
State who did not believe, with Senators Crittenden and 
Douglas, that the difficulty would be settled by a com- 
promise of some sort, and without an appeal to arms. 
Of secessionists proper, using the term in the sense we 
have given to it, there was not a corporal's guard in the 
whole State. 

But whilst this statement is believed to be substan- 
tially true, it would be a grave mistake to suppose that 
the people of Missouri were in sympathy with the posi- 
tion which the triumphant Republicans of the North 
now occupied, or with the long course of action, legisla- 
tive and otherwise, that had led to it. So far were they 
from anything of the kind, that they held the Republi- 
can party responsible for the condition in which the 
country was placed, and in proof of it they referred to 
the continued interference, in Congress and out of it, 
with the institution of slavery ; to the repeated attempts 
to deprive the people of the South of their constitu- 
tional rights in and to the territories that should have 
been common to all ; and they pointed to the fact that, 
at this very time, fourteen out of the seventeen free 
States had upon their statute-books laws which were 
intended not only to nullify the act of Congress for the 
return of fugitive slaves, but were in direct violation of 
an express mandate of the Constitution. 

With such facts staring them in the face, it was not 



266 Missouri. 

possible for the people of the State to shut their eyes 
to the aggressive spirit which the North — except, per- 
haps, in the one case of the repeal of the Missouri 
Compromise — had manifested when dealing with any 
proposition that looked to an increase in the number 
of slave States ; nor could they forget the declarations 
of Lincoln and other leaders of the Republican party 
that " a house divided against itself must fall," and that 
" this country could not permanently endure half slave 
and half free." Clearly, if these were the sentiments of 
the Northern people, it was their duty as patriots, now 
that they had control of the executive department of the 
government, to do what they could to remove the last 
vestige of slavery from the country ; and, conceding to 
them the same honesty and sincerity which they claimed 
for themselves, the people of the Southern States had 
no reason to doubt that such would be their course. In 
view, then, of these declarations, and of the success 
in the presidential election of the party that indorsed 
them, the people of Missouri may be excused for think- 
ing that the South had a right to demand additional 
guaranties against Northern aggression. Exactly what 
these guaranties were to be was never clearly formu- 
lated. In a vague sort of way it was said that they 
must be embodied in a constitutional provision, though 
how that provision was to be enforced, or made any 
more binding than were the mandates of the Constitu- 
tion under which they now lived and of the violation of 
which they complained, is a point upon which we are 
left to conjecture. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

THE LEGISLATURE AND THE CONSTITUTIONAL CONVEN- 
TION : MISSOURI DECIDES FOR THE UNION. 

Although the Breckenridge, or Southern rights men, 
were in a minority in the State even when compared with 
the supporters of Douglas, in the legislature they outnum- 
bered either of the other parties. Not being numerous 
enough, however, to effect an organization by themselves, 
they united with the Douglas men, and by this means 
they secured the election of their candidate for speaker. 
The newly chosen President of the Senate, too, Lieuten- 
ant-Governor Thomas C. Reynolds, belonged to their 
wing of the party, as did the governor-elect, Claiborne F, 
Jackson, so that the Southern rights Democrats were in 
possession of the chief places in the legislative and exec- 
utive departments of the State ; and but for the fact that 
they voluntarily relinquished their power into the hands 
of a constitutional convention, it was possible for them to 
have given the course of legislation a very different di- 
rection from that which it was eventually made to take. 

The retiring governor, Robert M. Stewart, belonged 
to a different school of politics. He was a Northern 
man by birth and no friend to slavery, though he 
" believed that the Southern people had the right to 
take their slaves into all the territories and hold them 
there, under the protection of the Constitution." He 
was, moreover, a staunch Union man ; and in the valedic- 



268 Missouri. 

tory message which he sent in on the meeting of the 
General Assembly, he denounced the heresy of secession, 
and took the ground that, no matter what the other slave 
States might do, it was the duty of Missouri, as it was 
her interest, to remain within the Union. But whilst 
his opinions upon this point were very decided, he was 
not blind to the scant measure of justice which the 
South had received, or to the dangers that might come 
to her institutions from hostile legislation ; and he be- 
lieved that the only way to maintain the Union was for 
the North to give the South guaranties against the 
threatened aggressions, — " not such ephemeral contracts 
as are enacted by Congress to-day and repealed to-mor- 
row, but a compromise assuring all the just rights of the 
States, and agreed to in solemn convention of all the 
parties interested. Upon this subject," he continued, 
" Missouri has the right to speak, because she has suf- 
fered. Bounded on three sides by free territory, her 
border counties have been the frequent scenes of kid- 
napping and violence, and this State has probably lost as 
much in the last two years, in the abduction of slaves, as 
all the rest of the Southern States. At this moment 
several of the western counties are desolated, and al- 
most depopulated, from fear of a bandit horde who 
have been committing depredation — arson, theft, and 
foul murder — upon her adjacent border. Missouri 
has a right, too, by reason of her present position and 
power, as well as from the great calamities which a hasty 
dissolution of the Union would bring upon her. She 
has already a larger voting population than any of the 
slave States, with prospective power and wealth far be- 
yond any of her sister States. . . . Indeed, Missouri 
and her sister border States should be the first, instead 



MISSOURI DECIDES FOR THE UNION. 269 

of the last, to speak on a subject of this kind. They 
have suffered the evil and the wrong, and should be the 
first to demand redress. Is it quite proper that those 
who have suffered no pecuniary loss should initiate a 
proceeding of this kind, and say to us, by their premature 
action, that we do not know when to redress our wrongs 
or defend our honor ? Our people would feel more sym- 
pathy with the movement if it had originated amongst 
those who, like ourselves, had suffered severe loss and 
constant annoyance from the interference and depreda- 
tions of outsiders. 

" As matters are at present, Missouri will . . . hold 
to the Union so long as it is worth an effort to preserve 
it. So long as there is hope of success, she will seek for 
justice within the Union. She cannot be frightened 
from her propriety by the past unfriendly legislation of 
the North, nor be dragooned into secession by the ex- 
treme South. If those who should be our friends and 
allies undertake to . . . reduce us to the position of an 
humble sentinel to watch over and protect their inter- 
ests, receiving all of the blows and none of the benefits, 
Missouri will hesitate long before sanctioning such an 
arrangement. She will rather take the high position of 
armed neutrality. . . . 

" If South Carolina and other cotton States persist 
in secession, she will desire to see them go in peace, with 
the hope that a short experience at separate govern- 
ment, and an honorable adjustment of the federal com- 
pact, will induce them to return to their former position. 
In the mean time Missouri will hold herself in readiness 
at any moment to defend her soil from pollution and 
her property from plunder by fanatics and marauders, 
come from what quarter they may." 



270 MISSOURI. 

In this vein he continued for some time longer, and 
then, after painting in glowing colors the benefits that 
had flowed from the e'stablishment of the Union, and 
the evils that must necessarily follow its dissolution, he 
concluded with an impassioned appeal for its preserva- 
tion, in the course of which he said that, "whilst rec- 
ommending the adoption of all proper measures and in- 
fluences to secure the just acknowledgment and protec- 
tion of our rights, and, in final failure of this, a resort 
to the last painful remedy of separation ; yet, regard- 
ing . . . the American confederacy as the source of a 
thousand blessings, pecuniary, social, and moral, and its 
destruction as fraught with incalculable loss, suffering, 
and crime, I would here, in my last public official act 
as governor of Missouri, record my solemn protest 
against unwise and hasty action, and my unalterable 
devotion to the Union, so long as it can be made the 
protector of equal rights." 

This message was received on the 3d of January, and 
on the same day Governor Jackson was sworn into office 
and delivered his inaugural address. 

Born in Kentucky of Virginia parentage, Jackson had 
come to Missouri in his boyhood, and found employment 
in a country store. By the time he was thirty years of 
age he had accumulated enough of this world's goods to 
enable him to retire from business and devote himself to 
politics, " for which he had a natural aptitude and great 
fondness." In 1836, he was first elected- to the legisla- 
ture, and from that time until his death in 1862 he was 
steadily in public life. In 1849 he was a member of 
the state senate, and, as chairman of the committee on 
federal relations, he reported the resolutions of instruc- 
tions which bear his name, and which, as we have seen, 



MISSOURI DECIDES FOR THE UNION. 271 

led to Benton's appeal from the decision of the legisla- 
ture to the people of the State. In the fierce struggle 
that ensued, Jackson was a conspicuous figure, and it 
was the readiness he showed in debate, and the skill he 
displayed in the management of men, that gave him the 
leading position which he then took in the councils of 
his party, and which he ever afterwards maintained. 

He was at this time fifty-five years of age, and is de- 
scribed by one who knew him well as being " tall, erect, 
and dignified ; a vigorous thinker, and a fluent and for- 
cible speaker, always interesting, and often eloquent ; a 
well-informed man, thoroughly conversant with the poli- 
tics of Missouri and of the Union ; with positive opinions 
on all public questions, and the courage to express and 
uphold them ; courteous in his bearing towards all men, 
for he was kind-hearted, and by nature a democrat ; 
and a truthful, honest, and honorable gentleman. He 
loved the Union, but not with the love with which he 
loved Missouri, which had been his home for forty years, 
nor as he loved the South, where he was born and where 
his kindred lived." 1 

Called to the high position which he now occupied at 
a moment of unparalleled excitement, he is said to have 
" assumed the office with becoming modesty, but with an 
unshakable determination to defend the honor and the 
interests of Missouri against all assailants whatsoever." 

In the course of his address, after commenting on the 
rise of the Republican party, he went on to say that it 

1 For these facts, and many others in the course of this and the 
succeeding chapter, I am indebted to Colonel Thomas L. Snead, 
whose Fight for Missouri must be carefully studied by any one who 
wishes to arrive at a correct understanding- of the course of events 
in Missouri at this critical period. 



272 Missouri. 

was purely sectional, and that its one principle was hos- 
tility to slavery. Its object was, " not merely to confine 
slavery within its present limits ; not merely to exclude 
it from the territories, and prevent the formation and 
admission of any slaveholding States, . . . but to strike 
down its existence everywhere. . . . The triumph of 
such an organization is not the victory of a political 
party, but the domination of a section. It proclaims in 
significant tones the destruction of that equality among 
the States which is the vital cement of our federal 
Union." 

The destiny of the slaveholding States was one and 
the same, and Missouri, he thought, would " best con- 
sult her own interests, and the interests of the whole 
country, by a timely declaration of her determination to 
stand by her sister slaveholding States, in whose wrongs 
she participates, and with whose institutions and peo- 
ple she sympathizes. These views," he said, " are ad- 
vanced, not upon a belief that all hope of the present 
Union is lost, but upon a conviction that the time has 
arrived when a further postponement of their considera- 
tion would be unwise and unsafe. ... So far as Mis- 
souri is concerned, her citizens have ever been devoted 
to the Union, and she will remain in it so long as there 
is any hope that it will maintain the spirit and guaran- 
ties of the Constitution. 

" But if the Northern States have determined to put 
the slaveholding States on a footing of inequality by 
interdicting them from all share in the territories ac- 
quired by the common blood and treasure of all ; if they 
have resolved to admit no more slaveholding States into 
the Union ; and if they mean to persist in nullifying 
that provision of the Constitution which secures to the 



MISSOURI DECIDES FOR THE UNION. 273 

slaveholder his property when found within the limits 
of States which do not recognize it or have abolished 
it, — then they have themselves practically abandoned 
the Union. . . . 

" We hear it suggested in some quarters," he con- 
tinued, " that the Union is to be maintained by the 
sword," but this, he urged, would lead to consolidation 
or despotism, not to union. " That stands upon the 
basis of justice and equality, and its existence cannot be 
prolonged by coercion. 

" As the ultimate fate of all the slaveholding States 
is necessarily the same, their determination and action 
. . . should be the result of a general consultation," 
and should be in the nature of a demand for a constitu- 
tional guaranty and not a congressional compromise, 
" as experience had shown that such compromises only 
lay the foundation for additional agitation. Being but 
laws, they are, like all other laws, liable to be repealed ; 
and their duration depends altogether upon the fluctua- 
tions of public opinion, operating through the representa- 
tives of that opinion at Washington." In conclusion he 
said that he was " not without hope that an adjustment 
alike honorable to both sections may be effected, . . . 
but in the present unfavorable aspect of affairs it is our 
duty to prepare for the worst. We cannot avoid dan- 
ger by closing our eyes to it. The magnitude of the 
interests now in jeopardy demands a prompt but deliber- 
ate consideration ; and in order that the will of the peo- 
ple may be ascertained and effectuated, a State conven- 
tion should ... be called." He also advised, " in view of 
the marauding forays which continue to harass our bor- 
ders, as well as of the general unsettled condition of our 
political relations," that the militia of the State should 
be thoroughly organized. 



274 Missouri. 

Upon a comparison of these two messages it will be 
found that up to a certain point they are in full accord, 
and there can be no question that to that extent they 
reflected the sentiments of an overwhelming majority of 
the people of the State. It was only in the event of the 
attempt on the part of the North to coerce the seceding 
States back into the Union, that the paths recommended 
by Stewart and Jackson began to diverge. In such a 
contingency the former thought the true policy of Mis- 
souri was to adhere to the Union, whilst the latter held 
that the honor as well as the interest of the State re- 
quired her to make common cause with the South. As 
yet, this issue was in abeyance, and there were, compar- 
atively speaking, but few who imagined that she would 
ever be called upon to make the decision. Among these 
few, though, was Francis Preston Blair, Jr., the leader 
of the unconditional Union men of the State. With 
rare foresight, he had already grasped the situation, 
and even now he was busy organizing the force which, 
when the moment of action came, enabled him to lay 
an iron hand upon the city of St. Louis, and by a move- 
ment necessary, perhaps, but none the less revolution- 
ary, drive the regularly constituted authorities of the 
State away from the capital and into exile. 

Blair was then forty years of age, having been born 
in Lexington, Kentucky, in February, 1821, of Vir- 
ginia parentage. When but a lad, his father, upon the 
invitation of General Jackson, removed to Washing- 
ton city, and took the editorial control of the adminis- 
tration organ ; and it was in this school and under such 
teachers that " Frank Blair," as he was familiarly called, 
learned his first lessons in politics. In due time he was 
sent to Princeton College, and soon after he came to 



MISSOURI DECIDES FOR THE UNION. 275 

St. Louis, where, in 1843, we find him studying law in 
the office of his brother, Judge Montgomery Blair, af- 
terwards postmaster-general under President Lincoln. 
In 1845, on the outbreak of the Mexican war, he was 
in Sante Fe, whither he had gone for his health ; and 
when Kearney took possession of that territory and an- 
nexed it to the United States, he appointed him attor- 
ney general in the provisional government which was 
then established, and of which Charles Bent was the 
head. Returning to St. Louis in 1847, young Blair 
made his first appearance in the political field in the 
presidential election of 1848, when he championed the 
cause of Van Buren, the unsuccessful candidate of the 
free-soilers. In the following year, he supported Col- 
onel Benton on the occasion of his appeal from the leg- 
islature to the people of the State ; and when death 
removed that doughty warrior from the field of Mis- 
souri politics, Blair, by common consent, took his place, 
and became the leader of the anti-slavery men of the 
State. In 1852 and again in 1854 he was elected to the 
legislature upon the Benton ticket ; and in 1856 he was 
transferred to the national House of Representatives at 
Washington, of which body he was a member - elect, 
having been returned, for the second time, at the pre- 
ceding election. 

During all this portion of his career, and in fact until 
slavery was stricken down by the strong hand of arbi- 
trary power, Blair was its steady and consistent oppo- 
nent, though he was by no means an abolitionist in the 
sense in which that term was then used. He did, it is 
true, wish to get rid of the negroes in Missouri, and his 
efforts were no doubt directed to this end. He was 
also in favor of keeping them out of all territory not 



276 Missouri. 

yet cursed by the presence of slavery ; but in taking 
this course he was governed by economic considerations, 
and " not by a sentimental regard for the blacks, or a de- 
lusion as to their equality with the whites." In a word, 
he approached the subject as a statesman, rather than as a 
moralist, and he wished to abolish the system in Missouri 
because he saw that it was a burden upon the State, and 
must inevitably retard her development in wealth and 
population. 

For advocating these views, he was often called an 
abolitionist, which troubled him but little ; and it is pos- 
sible, though Colonel Benton did not find it so, that 
there may have been portions of the State in which it 
would not have been safe for him to speak his senti- 
ments on this subject ; but this was evidently not the 
case in St. Louis, where his friends were in the major- 
ity, where his personal popularity, even among those 
who differed from him politically, was very great, and 
where his high social position was unquestioned. In- 
deed, it may well be doubted whether Blair himself 
thought so, for in those days, as some of us can remem- 
ber, there was no surer way of leading him to make a 
fierce attack upon slavery, no matter how unpalatable 
his speech may have been to some of his hearers, than by 
assuring him that its delivery would be attended with 
personal danger. In the pursuit of an object which he 
had once marked out for himself as desirable and proper, 
he knew no such thing as fear, and it is but just to add 
that in moral courage he was equally grand. 

Such was the man to whom the Union men of Mis- 
souri now turned, and not in vain, for counsel and en- 
couragement. As has already been intimated, he was 
one of the few who realized the full significance of the 



MISSOURI DECIDES FOR THE UNION. 277 

impending struggle, and he never deluded himself with 
the hope that it might be peaceably settled. From the 
first, he seems to have felt instinctively that it was 
one of those questions that could only be decided by an 
appeal to the sword, and, acting on the maxim that 
" God fights on the side of the heavest battalions," he 
began at once to make ready for the part which he in- 
tended to play in the bloody drama. 

These preparations, it is proper to say, were not car- 
ried on with any very great amount of secrecy, and in 
fact there was no particular reason why they should 
have been, though the contrary has been asserted. The 
semi-military associations, composed chiefly of Germans, 
which, under the name of Wide-A wakes, had done good 
service for Lincoln in the election of 1860, had a per- 
fect right to continue their organization as Union clubs, 
home guards, or under any other name that they might 
think proper to adopt, and that they were doing so, was 
well understood. The use, too, to which they were to 
be put in case an effort was made to detach Missouri 
from the Union, was never doubted by any one who 
knew Blair ; and yet, despite this fact, so reluctant were 
Governor Jackson and the Southern sympathizers in the 
legislature to take any steps that would bring the State 
into conflict with the federal government, without the pre- 
viously expressed approval of the people, that, although 
they were fully alive to the necessities of the situation, 
they failed to take advantage of the only opportunity 
they ever had of securing such a supply of arms as 
would have enabled them to meet Blair, upon anything 
like equal terms, in the fight which he was evidently 
determined to make for Missouri. Had they shown as 
little hesitation in making war upon the federal govern- 



278 Missouri. 

ment as, some four months later, the federal government 
showed in making war upon Missouri, they would have 
seized the arsenal, as there is reason to believe they 
might have done at almost any time during the first 
three weeks of January, 1861, and as it was clearly 
their policy to do, with or without law, in case they had 
resolved upon secession, and had the power to carry 
their resolution into effect. Instead of doing so, they 
contented themselves with adopting a measure, which 
not only committed them to a course of delay when in- 
stant action was necessary to the success of their cause, 
but which involved, on their part, a relinquishment of 
the power of legislation upon the very question that 
was at issue. By the terms of this act, which was 
approved on the 21st of January, it was provided that 
an election should be held on the 18th of February 
for members of a convention who were "to consider 
the relations between the government of the United 
States . . . and the government and people of the State 
of Missouri ; and to adopt such measures for vindicat- 
ing the sovereignty of the State, and the protection of 
its institutions, as shall appear to them to be demanded." 
By way of safeguard, it was added that " no act, ordi- 
nance, or resolution of said convention shall be deemed 
to be valid to change or dissolve the political relations 
of this State to the government of the United States, 
or any other State, until a majority of the qualified vot- 
ers of this State, voting upon the question, shall ratify 
the same." 

So far as the action of Blair and the Wide-A wakes 
was concerned, the adoption of this measure was with- 
out any practical effect. He had made up his mind 
that, in a certain contingency, he would wage war upon 



MISSOURI DECIDES FOR THE UNION. 279 

his State, and, as in that event it would make but little 
difference what laws or how many of them stood in the 
way, he did not consider it necessary to pretermit his 
exertions to arm and equip the recruits that were flock- 
ing to his standard. 

Not so, in regard to the Southern sympathizers, or 
secessionists, as, for the sake of brevity, we shall now 
call them. To them, and the cause they had so much 
at heart, this measure was full of serious consequences. 
As has been said, it amounted practically to an abdica- 
tion by the legislature of certain powers, and, although 
in all probability not so intended, yet, in so far as it 
gave occasion to the exhibition of Union sentiment 
which took place at the February election, it was 
fraught with disaster to the cause of the South. No 
matter from what point of view we approach it, the 
effect will be found to have been the same. Regarded 
as a political measure, it checked at once the drift of 
Missouri secessionward, and later on, by a vote that ad- 
mitted of no dispute, it fixed her position firmly in and 
with the Union. By the same token, it placed her vast 
resources in men and quartermasters' stores at the ser- 
vice of the Union, and, speaking militarily, it may be 
roughly said to have thrown back the Confederate line 
of battle from the Missouri to the Arkansas. 

Curiously enough, although this measure brought with 
it an Iliad of woes to the cause of the South, yet so 
little were its consequences foreseen, that at the time of 
its adoption it was regarded by the Southern sympa- 
thizers as a triumph. In a certain sense this was per- 
haps true, for it enabled them to appeal to the people 
of the State upon an issue upon which they could not 
carry the legislature, but from any other point of view 



280 MISSOURI. 

it was a mistake. The times were revolutionary, and 
whilst the Southern rights men in the legislature may 
have had every confidence in the result of the appeal 
to the people, they do not ajypear to have realized the 
fact that every moment of delay strengthened Blair 
and weakened them. Indeed, when we reflect that the 
very measure, which they welcomed as a harbinger of 
success, not only tied the hands of their friends at a 
time when instant action could alone have saved their 
cause, but that it also resulted in the total annihilation 
of their party at the succeeding election, it would seem 
as if the irony of fate could scarcely have reached 
further. 

To understand the influences that combined to 
bring about the adoption of this measure, it is necessary 
to bear in mind that the three leading parties in the 
legislature, consisting respectively of the followers of 
Breckinridge, Douglas, and Bell, were so evenly divided 
that they served as checks upon one another. The 
Southern sympathizers, whose main support was drawn 
from the Breckinridge men, were not strong enough to 
carry a resolution in favor of secession, even if they 
had been disposed to do so ; and the Union men, 
though united upon one point, differed among them- 
selves to such an extent upon certain ulterior issues 
that it was difficult for them to find any ground which 
they could occupy in common. Moreover, at the time 
of the election, the question of secession had not en- 
tered into the canvass, and consequently there was no 
certainty as to what was the prevailing sentiment of the 
people of the State in regard to it. For these reasons, 
among others, the members of the legislature, unwill- 
ing to assume the responsibility of committing the State 



MISSOURI DECIDES FOR THE UNION. 281 

to a line of action that might prove unacceptable, and 
hopeful, perhaps, of the success of their respective views, 
joined, almost without distinction of party, in refer- 
ring the question back to the people. In the Senate 
there were but two votes against the measure, and in 
the House but eighteen, eleven of whom were Republi- 
cans from St. Louis. In fact, it may be said that the 
Republicans alone opposed it ; and yet, by an unex- 
pected turn of the wheel, their wing of the Union party 
was the only one that derived a permanent benefit from 
it. Probably no more striking instance can be given of 
the changes that were now going on in the opinions of 
the people of the border States, or of the certainty 
with which the Union men were gradually coming up to 
the position to which they were logically committed. 

With the adoption of this measure all political legis- 
lation came, for the time being, to an end. Resolu- 
tions, it is true, were adopted which denounced coercion 
in vigorous terms, and pledged Missouri to resist it by 
force ; but except in so far as they may be taken as in- 
dicating the opinions of the individual members of the 
legislature, they amounted to nothing. The power to 
decide upon the course which Missouri was to follow 
was now in the hands of the convention, placed there 
by the act of the legislature itself, and so long as this 
act was unrepealed, any attempt on the part of the leg- 
islature to shape that course was a mere waste of time. 

In the canvass which now took place for the choice 
of delegates to the convention, the best men in the State 
came to the front. The rights of the States and the 
authority of the federal government to coerce a State ; 
the relations of Missouri to the Union, to the seceded 
States, and her duty in the premises to them and to 



282 Missouri. 

herself, — in a word, the whole question of secession, so 
far as it bore upon the future of the State, was thor- 
oughly discussed, and with an earnestness and an ab- 
sence of excitement that showed how deeply impressed 
the great mass of the people were with the gravity of 
the situation. 

Among those who were most prominent on the side 
of the South, we may mention the governor of the 
State, Senators James S. Green and Trusten Polk, ex- 
Senator and ex-Vice-President David R. Atchison, with 
Vest, Parsons, Claiborne, Churchill, and others in the 
General Assembly. Their organ was the " St. Louis 
Bulletin," of which J. W. Tucker and Thomas L. 
Snead were the editors. From the latter, whose position 
as a chosen counselor of Governor Jackson, and sub- 
sequently as a trusted officer on General Price's staff, 
enabled him to speak with authority as to the motives 
of his party friends, we learn that there were but few 
of them who were primarily secessionists or believed 
in the right of secession. They deplored the precipi- 
tate action of South Carolina and the other seceding 
States, and would gladly have persuaded them to re- 
turn to the Union and trust to peaceful methods for the 
protection of their rights. They were not particularly 
devoted to the institution of slavery, nor were they 
deeply interested in the maintenance of that system. 
They were secessionists only because they believed that 
the Union had been dissolved, that its reconstruc- 
tion was impossible, that war was inevitable, and that 
in war the place of Missouri was by the side of the 
Southern States. Opposed to them were the Union 
men, who were divided among themselves, according to 
the degree of their loyalty, into conditional and uncon- 



MISSOURI DECIDES FOR THE UNION. 283 

ditional Union men, but who upon this occasion, thanks 
to the adroit management of Blair, voted together. Of 
these two subdivisions, the former was composed almost 
altogether of those who had supported Douglas and 
Bell at the presidential election, and, as events subse- 
quently proved, they constituted a large majority of 
the people of the State. They did not believe in seces- 
sion as a remedy for the evils of which the South 
complained, and in their speeches and writings they 
avowed their attachment to the Union, and declared 
their intention of standing by it so long as there was a 
hope of preserving it. Some plan of adjustment, they 
felt certain, would be adopted, and they referred to 
the Crittenden proposition, which had been declared 
satisfactory by those representative Southern senators, 
Toombs of Georgia, and Davis of Mississippi, as af- 
fording a basis of settlement upon which all could agree. 
If, however, the North should refuse to listen to the 
just demand of the South for additional guaranties 
against aggressive legislation, it would then, they 
thought and said, be the duty of Missouri to unite with 
the Southern States for the protection of their common 
interests, including, of course, slavery. They also de- 
clared that " if the North, pending the attempt to adjust 
matters peaceably, should make war upon any Southern 
State, Missouri would take up arms in its defense." 

The position of the unconditional Union men differed 
from this in one very important particular. As their 
name indicated, they took the ground that they would 
support the government in any and every measure that 
might be deemed necessary to preserve the Union and 
enforce the laws. They were recruited from the ranks 
of the Republicans, or supporters of Lincoln, and, natu- 



284 Missouri. 

rally enough, they were elated at their success at the 
late election, and provoked at what seemed to them to 
be the refusal of the secessionists to abide by the result 
of that election. In St. Louis, where, alone in the 
State, they could expect to form an appreciable factor 
in the political problem, a large majority of them were 
Germans, though their leaders were Anglo-Americans, 
and, with but few exceptions, men of Southern birth 
and lineage. Between them and the conditional Union 
men there was but little sympathy ; in fact, not much 
could have been expected when one party held the other 
responsible for the deplorable condition in which affairs 
then were, and the other recriminated by charging their 
quasi friends and allies with being but little better than 
secessionists in disguise. So bitter was the feeling that 
it required all of Blair's tact and management to induce 
the two wings of the party to work together against the 
common enemy. " I don't believe," said a Republican 
partisan, " in breaking up the Republican party just to 
please these tender-footed Unionists. I believe in stick- 
ing to the party.'' " Let us have a country first," 
responded Blair, " and then we can talk about parties." 
This was sound advice, and backed as it was by the 
full weight of Blair's personal influence, it resulted, in 
St. Louis, in the formation of a ticket composed of 
seven Douglas, three Bell, and four Lincoln men, which 
swept the county by a majority of over five thousand. 
In the State at large the victory of the Union men was 
not less complete. By a majority of eighty thousand 
the people of Missouri decided against secession. Not 
a single member of that party was returned to the con- 
vention ; though there were a number of the delegates 
who were believers in the doctrine of states - rights, or 



MISSOURI DECIDES FOR THE UNION. 285 

as it is now termed, local self-government. Of the whole 
number of members eighty-one were born in the slave 
States, fourteen in the North, three in Europe, and one 
in the District of Columbia. 

To speak of the result of the election as being a sur- 
prise and a disappointment to the secessionist leaders is 
but faintly to describe the feelings with which they wit- 
nessed the overthrow of their air-built castles. They 
had worked themselves into the belief that Missouri was 
ready to follow South Carolina and the rest of the cotton 
States into the secessionist camp, and was only waiting 
for the forthcoming election in order to do so ; and so 
satisfied were they of it that they did not hesitate to 
counsel delay to a small and gallant band of their 
friends, who were anxious to attempt the seizure of the 
arsenal. " Wait," said they in effect, " until the people 
shall, at the forthcoming election, declare their intention 
of siding with the South ! Then the governor will order 
General Frost to seize the arsenal in the name of the 
State, and he with his brigade and the minute men and 
the thousands " who it was supposed would flock to his 
aid, could easily do it. 

From these dreams, as they are now known to have 
been, the secessionist members of the General Assem- 
bly were rudely awakened by the result of the election. 
It was a verdict that admitted of no misinterpretation, 
and as such it was accepted. The military bill, as it 
was called, which was intended to arm and equip the 
militia, and was supposed, in some quarters, to cloak a 
project for forcing the State into secession, was accord- 
ingly shelved, and Missouri prepared of her own free 
will, and by the votes of her chosen delegates, eighty per 
cent, of whom were southern born, to take her place with 
the loyal North. 



286 Missouri. 

On the 28th of February, agreeably to the law which 
called it into existence, the convention met at Jefferson 
City. Sterling Price, a decided Union man k who had 
been member of Congress, governor of the State, and 
had played a conspicuous part in the conquest and oc- 
cupation of New Mexico, was chosen president, the vote 
being seventy-five for Price, to fifteen for Nathaniel W. 
Watkins, a half-brother of Henry Clay. As soon as 
the organization was complete, an adjournment was had 
to St. Louis, whose loyal atmosphere is said to have 
been preferable to that of the capital, though it is prob- 
able that the comfort and convenience of the members, 
to say nothing of the desirability of having a suitable 
hall for their deliberations, may have had something to 
do with the change. On the 4th of March, the day of 
Lincoln's inauguration, the convention reassembled in 
St. Louis, and by an ominous conjunction it was on the 
afternoon of this day that, by special invitation, Luther 
J. Glenn, commissioner from the State of Georgia, ap- 
peared before the convention for the purpose of making 
the communication with which he was charged. In a 
few well-chosen sentences he announced the secession of 
Georgia from the Union, with the reasons therefor, and 
in the name of his State he asked the people of Missouri 
to adopt a similar course, and unite with their kinsmen 
in Georgia in forming a Southern confederacy. His 
message was not favorably received, though the able 
adverse report of John B. Henderson was not acted 
upon, the necessity for such a proceeding having been 
superseded by the adoption of the report of the com- 
mittee on federal relations which virtually covered the 
same ground. 

This most important committee, appointed for the 



MISSOURI DECIDES FOR THE UNION. 287 

purpose of considering " the relations now existing be- 
tween the government of the United States, the govern- 
ment and people of the different States, and the govern- 
ment and people of this State," consisted of Hamilton 
R. Gamble, chairman, John B. Henderson, John T. 
Redd, William A. Hall, Jacob T. Tindall, Alexander 
W. Doniphan, Nathaniel W. Watkins, Willard P. Hall, 
Harrison Hough, Samuel L. Sawyer, William Doug- 
lass, John R. Chenault, and William J. Pomeroy. It 
was a picked body, fairly representative of the different 
shades of opinion that were to be found in the conven- 
tion ; and in the list of its members will be found the 
names of a number of those whom the State delighted 
to honor, and to whom their fellow-citizens now looked 
for counsel. 

On the 9th of March this committee made a report, 
which is a model of clear, compact statement and close, 
dispassionate reasoning. In it, they very properly draw 
a distinction between the action of individual Northern 
States and of the federal government ; and whilst ad- 
mitting that the people of the South had just cause of 
dissatisfaction with many of the former, they take oc- 
casion to say that, thus far, there had been no intima- 
tion that the latter had ever violated any of the rights of 
the Southern States, or had any intention of doing so. 
They also deemed it a subject of congratulation that, 
although " a spirit of insubordination to law, unequaled, 
perhaps, in any other civilized country, reigned through- 
out the land, yet the judicial tribunals of the federal 
government had not failed, in any case that had been 
brought before them, to maintain the rights of Southern 
citizens, and to punish the violators of these rights." 
The cause, then, of the present condition of affairs, they 



288 Missouri. 

continued, was to be found in "the alienated feelings 
existing between the Northern and Southern sections of 
the country, rather than in the actual injury suffered by 
either; in the anticipation of future evils, rather than in 
the pressure of any now actually endured." 

In regard to the hostile legislation, which in almost 
all of the Northern States had taken the shape of per- 
sonal liberty bills, and was intended to nullify the act 
of Congress for the return of fugitive slaves, the com- 
mittee held, and very justly, that it was unconstitutional. 
The remedy for it, they maintained with equal justice, 
was provided by the Constitution, and was to be found 
not in secession, or " its equivalent, revolution," but in 
an appeal to the supreme court. This tribunal was the 
recognized arbiter in all such cases, and there was no 
reason to suppose that it would not vindicate the suprem- 
acy of the Constitution in this instance, as it had done 
in all others which had been submitted to it for adjudi- 
cation. 

Other points of law and fact which we must dismiss 
with a bare mention, were discussed with equal clear- 
ness. In conclusion, the committee, in a few pregnant 
paragraphs, refer to the destructive effect which seces- 
sion, or as they prefer to call it " revolution," would 
entail upon the best interests of the State, including 
slavery itself, and they ask what under the circumstances 
is the position Missouri ought to assume ? To this they 
answer : " Evidently that of a State whose interests are 
bound up in the maintenance of the Union, and whose 
kind feelings and strong sympathies are with the people 
of the Southern States, with whom we are connected by 
ties of friendship and blood. We want the peace and 
harmony of the country restored, and we want them 



MISSOURI DECIDES FOR THE UNION. 289 

with us. To go with them as they are now ... is to 
ruin ourselves without doing them any good. We can- 
not now follow them ; we cannot now give up the Union ; 
yet we will do all in our power to induce them to take 
their places with us in the family from which they have 
attempted to separate themselves. For this purpose we 
will not only recommend a compromise " (the Critten- 
den proposition), " with which they ought to be satisfied, 
but we will unite in the endeavor to procure an assem- 
blage of the whole family of States, in order that in a 
General Convention such amendments to the Constitu- 
tion may be agreed upon as shall permanently restore 
harmony to the whole nation." Such a recommenda- 
tion, it was thought, would come with appropriateness 
and effect from Missouri, for she " was brought forth in 
a storm, and cradled in a compromise." 

Accompanying this report was a series of resolutions 
which was adopted, but not without debate. Among 
them, the first and most important was the one which 
declared that there was " no adequate cause to impel 
Missouri to dissolve her connection with the Federal 
Union." Upon this, there was practically no disagree- 
ment, the vote upon its adoption being .eighty-nine to 
one — Mr. Bast of Montgomery. The others were of 
less moment, though among them were one or two that 
were possessed of a certain interest, not so much on ac- 
count of any effect which they had in " stilling the tem- 
pest," as from the fact that they showed how tenaciously 
the people of the State clung to the fast-disappearing 
hope of a compromise, and how surely the loose and 
shifting Union sentiment was crystallizing into uncon- 
ditional loyalty. 

This latter fact was made especially manifest in the 
course of the debate which took place upon an amend- 



290 MISSOURI. 

merit declaring what Missouri would do in case the North 
should attempt to coerce the seceding States back into 
the Union. Thus, for instance, when it was said that 
she would never furnish a regiment for any such purpose, 
William A. Hall tersely replied that Missouri was in the 
Union, and it was her duty to respond to all demands 
that the federal government might constitutionally make 
upon her. This was certainly plain enough ; and what 
was more to the point, it admitted, logically, of no satis- 
factory answer. Nor was this all. Events outside of 
the convention had moved rapidly of late, and the ques- 
tion now, among those who knew whereof they spoke, 
was not what Missouri would or would not do, but 
what she was to be permitted to do. " Missouri has 
not the power to go out of the Union if she would," said 
James O. Broadhead of St. Louis, a Virginian by birth 
and one of Blair's most trusted advisers, in the course of 
a speech in which he pictured the State as standing in 
the pathway to the Pacific, and urged this as a reason 
why the North would never consent to her secession. 
" Missouri has not the power to go out of the Union if 
she would," he repeated, and little as the truth of the 
statement was then suspected, it was soon seen to be 
fraught with meaning. Head in the light of subsequent 
events, it meant that the arsenal was safe, that Blair was 
ready to strike, and only bided his time. 

The adoption of this report virtually closed the pro- 
ceedings of the convention, and on the 22d of March it 
adjourned to the third Monday in December, but not 
until a committee had been appointed with power to call 
it together at an earlier date, should such a course be 
deemed necessary. On the 28th of the same month the 
General Assembly, which of late had been chiefly en- 
gaged in local legislation, also adjourned. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

THE ARSENAL, CAMP JACKSON, AND THE SECOND 
MEETING OF THE CONVENTION. 

The refusal of President Buchanan to withdraw the 
Federal troops from Charleston, and his evident deter- 
mination to regain possession of the forts which had been 
surrendered to South Carolina, and to reinforce those 
which still held out, hastened the action of Georgia and 
the Gulf States, and led them, early in January, 1861, 
even before they had formally seceded, to seize the 
arsenals and such other public property as were within 
their limits. This proceeding, which was epigrammati- 
cally described by Blair as u stealing empty forts and 
full treasuries," but which was nothing more than the 
practical application of the doctrine, then quite common, 
of state sovereignty, naturally directed the attention of 
the leaders of the different political parties in Missouri 
to the arsenal in St. Louis, and set them to work planning 
how they might get control of the forty thousand mus- 
kets and other munitions of war which it was known to 
contain. They felt that upon the success or failure of 
their efforts to accomplish this purpose depended the 
future of the State ; for let the result be what it might, 
they knew the party that obtained those guns would be 
able to hold St. Louis and Missouri, by virtue of its 
ability to arm its adherents. 

Impressed with this belief, and satisfied that move- 



292 MISSOURI. 

ments were on foot among irresponsible parties, Union- 
ist as well as Secessionist, to take possession of this 
post, General D. M. Frost, of the Missouri state militia, 
a graduate of West Point and a thorough soldier, is said 
to have called Governor Jackson's attention to the neces- 
sity of " looking after " it, so that the State might be in 
a condition to arm her troops, as he was satisfied she 
would, sooner or later, have to do, whether she fought 
for the Union or against it, or whether, having declared 
for neutrality, she simply wished to make her position 
respected. Jackson, however, needed no prompting. 
The secession of the cotton States had, he thought, made 
disunion an accomplished fact ; and as he had long since 
come to the conclusion that, in such an event, Missouri's 
place would be with the South, and as, moreover, he had 
no doubt that this was the sentiment of the people of the 
State generally, he did not hesitate to give Frost author- 
ity to seize the arsenal, whenever in his judgment it 
might become necessary to do so. Meanwhile he was 
to assist in protecting it against mob violence of any 
kind or from any source. In the discharge of this 
duty, Frost called upon Major William H. Bell, the 
commandant of the arsenal, who gave him to understand 
that whilst he was determined to defend the post against 
any and all irresponsible mobs, come from whence they 
might, he would not attempt to defend it against the 
proper State authorities, as he was of the opinion that, 
whenever the time came, the State had the right to claim 
it as being on her soil. He also promised that he would 
not suffer any arms to be removed from the place 
without giving notice of the fact. In return, Frost 
engaged to use the force at his command to protect the 
arsenal from the assaults of all persons whatsoever. 



THE ARSENAL AND CAMP JACKSON. 293 

though he frankly avowed that, in view of the present 
defenseless condition of the place, and in order to carry- 
out this purpose, it might become necessary for him to 
come down and quarter troops there, to which Major 
Bell assented. These assurances were satisfactory to 
Frost, as they were, of necessity, to the small but active 
band of secessionists which had been organized in the 
city, and which, as we have seen, was held in check by 
the advice of friends at Jefferson City ; and they fully 
justified Frost, who had every confidence in Major Bell's 
word, in declaring that he should now rest easy, though 
he intended to be " prepared with the proper force to act 
as emergency might require/' 

Frost, however, was not the only person in St. Louis 
who had his eyes fixed upon the arsenal and its con- 
tents. Frank Blair was looking longingly in the same 
direction, and was already busily engaged in organizing 
the bands which, supplied with guns from this very 
storehouse, enabled him, some four months later, to lay 
such a heavy hand upon Missouri. Just then, it is 
true, he could not arm them, for except the few muskets 
furnished by the liberality of his friends and through 
the instrumentality of Governor Yates of Illinois, he 
was without the necessary means ; but he did not permit 
this to interfere with the work of recruiting and drilling. 
That went on steadily, and as a consequence, when the 
moment came for action, Blair was able to appear at the 
decisive point with a well-armed force, ten times as numer- 
ous as that which his opponents could bring against him. 

In the mean time, whilst these two, or rather three, 
parties (for Frost can hardly be termed a secessionist, 
though as an officer in the service of the State he was 
willing to obey the orders of his commander) were 



294 Missouri. 

watching each other, the federal government awoke 
from its lethargy, and began to concentrate troops in St. 
Louis for the protection of its property. The first ar- 
rival, consisting of a detachment of forty-seven men, 
occurred on the 11th of January ; on the 24th, the very 
day that Frost reported to the governor the result of 
his visit to the arsenal, Major Bell was relieved from 
command and Major Hagner put in his place ; and by 
the 18th of February, the day of the election of dele- 
gates to the convention which pronounced so decidedly 
against secession, there were between four and five hun- 
dred men behind the arsenal walls, and under the com- 
mand of officers who would not have hesitated to use 
them in defense of the property intrusted to their care. 
With such a force, properly handled as this unquestion- 
ably would have been, the place was now so far from 
being in need of " protection," either by secessionists or 
Union men, that it was abundantly able to take care of 
itself ; and General Harney, who was in command of 
the department and presumably familiar with its con- 
dition, under date of February 19, notified the author- 
ities at Washington that there was no danger of an at- 
tack, and never had been. " If," added he, " one should 
be made, the garrison would be promptly rescued by an 
overwhelming force from the city." 

Such was not the opinion of Captain Nathaniel Lyon, 
who had arrived at the arsenal on the 6th of February, 
and who was destined, in the short space of the com- 
ing six months, to write his name indelibly in the his- 
tory of the State. He was at this time forty-three 
years of age, having been born at Ashford, Con- 
necticut, in July, 1818. In personal appearance he is 
described as having been " of less than medium height ; 



THE ARSENAL AND CAMP JACKSON. 295 

slender and angular ; with abundant hair of a sandy 
color, and a coarse, reddish-brown beard. He had 
deep-set blue eyes; features that were rough and 
homely ; and the weather-beaten aspect of a man who 
had seen much hard service on the frontier," as, in 
truth, he had. Indeed, it is quite probable that it was 
his service in Kansas during the troublous days of which 
we have spoken, the scenes which he had then witnessed 
and in some of which he had been an actor, that had so 
intensified his dislike of slavery and slaveholders as to 
make him forgetful, at times, of the distinction which 
should be drawn between the sin and the sinner. In 
his inability, too, to see more than one side of a ques- 
tion, and in the terrible earnestness with which he saw 
that, he betrayed the puritanical bent of his mind, as he 
also did in his impatience of control, and in the spirit of 
intolerance that made it impossible for him to under- 
stand how there could be two opinions upon a subject 
upon which he had made up his mind, and that caused 
him to attribute incapacity, or unworthy and improper 
motives, to any one who ventured to differ from him, or 
who failed to approve of the extreme measures to which 
he naturally inclined. This last characteristic is espe- 
cially noticeable in his political writings and in his treat- 
ment of Major Hagner, whose refusal to act upon his 
suggestions for strengthening the arsenal is said to have 
been the result of "imbecility or d — d villainy." It 
may also be seen in his denunciation of General Scott's 
decision awarding the command of the arsenal to 
Hagner and not to him, which we are told was made 
" in his usual sordid spirit of partisanship and favoritism 
to pets, and personal associates, and toadies ; " and it led 
him to question Lincoln's " resolution to grapple with 



296 Missouri. 

treason, and to put it down forever," and to express the 
fear that "he was not the man for the hour," and that 
" our political triumph had been in vain." 

Qualities like these are hardly of a character to com- 
mend their possessor to men of moderate views, and 
hence we find that in the efforts that were made in St. 
Louis and at Washington to effect Hagner's removal 
and Lyon's installment in his place, the latter gentle- 
man received but little aid from men of a conservative 
stamp. Even after the accession of Lincoln and the 
capture of Camp Jackson, his advancement was opposed 
by such Union men as Attorney General Edward Bates, 
Hamilton R. Gamble, the president of the convention, 
and James E. Yeatman, afterwards so well known as 
the efficient head of the Western Sanitary Commission. 
On the other hand he was possessed of certain soldier- 
ly qualities, and had withal a military way of untying 
political and legal knots that appealed at once to men 
of action, like Blair and Broadhead and the other mem- 
bers of the Union Safety Committee. Through all this 
trying period they supported him bravely and stead- 
fastly ; and it was due in great part to their ceaseless 
efforts that he finally succeeded in obtaining the ap- 
pointment which gave him the command of the arsenal 
and made him the master of St. Louis. 

As yet all this was in the future. President Bu- 
chanan's term of office still had a month to run, and so 
long as he remained in power neither Blair nor Lyon 
could hope for any special favor. All that they or 
any one could expect was that he would take care that 
the public property Was properly defended, and this 
he was evidently determined to do, whether the attack 
came from Union men or secessionists. In fact, it was 



THE ARSENAL AND CAMP JACKSON. 297 

owing to this very determination, and the consequent 
concentration of troops at the arsenal, that Lyon now 
found himself in St. Louis, and engaged in the con- 
genial occupation of drilling and disciplining the home 
guards, thereby transforming them from an unarmed 
mob of civilians into a band of trained soldiers, ready 
to defend, or if need be take the arsenal, and prepared 
at all times to fight for the Union. 

For this work he was well fitted, not only by his mili- 
tary training, but also by his tireless energy and his de- 
votion to the Union. It was to him a labor of love, and 
such was the zeal he brought to bear in its prosecution, 
the cheerful courage with which he bore up under the 
depressing influence of hope deferred, and the confi- 
dence that he manifested in the righteousness of the 
cause in which he was engaged and in its ultimate suc- 
cess, that he became a tower of strength to the weak 
and timid, and even among the strong and courageous 
he was speedily recognized as a leader. Under the 
stimulating influence of two such spirits as Blair and 
himself, the work of preparation went bravely on. By 
the middle of April, four regiments had been enlisted, 
and Lyon, who was now in command of the arsenal, 
though not of the department, proceeded to arm them 
in accordance with an order which Blair had procured 
from Washington. 

Backed by this force, Blair felt strong enough to set 
up an opposition to the state government, and accord- 
ingly, when Jackson refused to furnish the quota of 
troops assigned to Missouri under President Lincoln's 
call of April 15, 1861, he telegraphed to Washington 
that if an order to muster the men into the service was 
sent to Captain Lyon, " the requisition would be filled in 



298 Missouri. 

two days." The order was duly forwarded, and five 
regiments having been sworn in instead of four, as called 
for, Blair was offered the command. This he declined, 
and, on his recommendation, Lyon was elected in his 
place. On the 7th and 8th of May another brigade was 
organized, and Captain Thomas W. Sweeny, of the 2d 
Infantry, was elected commander. This made ten regi- 
ments of volunteers, besides several companies of regu- 
lars and a battery of artillery, that were now ready for 
service ; and as General Harney, whose relatives and 
associates were suspected of disloyalty, had been ordered 
to Washington to explain his position, Lyon was virtually 
in command of the department. The wished-f or oppor- 
tunity had come at last ; and Blair and Lyon, no longer 
trammeled by higher authority, and determined that 
Missouri should be made to fight for the Union instead 
of occupying the merely negative position which she had 
taken upon the question of secession, were now at liberty 
to carry out their plans. 

Meanwhile the February election had passed off with- 
out disturbance, and resulted, as has already been said, 
in an overwhelming defeat of the secessionists. It was 
a fatal blow to their cause, for it led the General Assem- 
bly to adjourn without taking any measures to put the 
State in a position either to fight or to defend her neu- 
trality. This, of course, left Governor Jackson power- 
less, and, as Snead says, " turned Missouri over, unarmed 
and defenseless, to Frank Blair and his home guards." 
In St. Louis, it is true, a small and gallant band of young 
men, under the lead of Basil W. Duke' and Colton 
Greene, both of whom afterwards held high command in 
the Confederate service, showed a disposition to contest 
the prize with him, but their efforts came to naught. 



THE ARSENAL AND CAMP JACKSON. 299 

For some unexplained reason, although possessed of ad- 
mirable recruiting grounds, they never numbered over 
three hundred men — not a tenth of the force with 
which Blair stood ready to overwhelm them ; and in the 
end they wisely dropped their organization as minute 
men, and formed a battalion, which was assigned to 
Frost's brigade of the state militia. 

Jackson, too, though possessed of but little actual 
power, was unwilling to give up the contest without an 
effort. He did not accept the decision of the February 
election as final, and as his views in regard to the posi- 
tion that Missouri should take in the impending struggle 
had undergone no change, he showed in this supreme 
moment of his life that he did not lack the courage of 
his convictions. Repairing to St. Louis as soon as the 
adjournment of the General Assembly had left him free, 
he began at once, in conjunction with certain leading 
secessionists, to concert measures for arming the militia 
of the State, and thus putting her in a condition to make 
her action, whatever it might be, effective. To this end, 
the seizure of the arsenal was held to be a prerequisite, 
and General Frost was preparing a memorial showing 
how this could best be done, when the surrender of Fort 
Sumter and the President's consequent call for troops 
hurried Jackson into a position of antagonism to the 
federal government, though no one knew better than 
he how inadequate the resources of the State were to 
maintain the defiant attitude which he assumed. How- 
ever, he was not dismayed. To the requisition made 
upon Missouri for four regiments to suppress combina- 
tions, maintain the Union, and repossess the forts which 
had been seized, he answered that she would not send a 
man for the purpose of carrying on an unholy crusade 



300 MISSOURI. 

against the people of the seceded States. Under the 
circumstances, this was a rash declaration, for, as events 
subsequently proved, the matter had already passed be- 
yond the control of the state authorities, though Jackson 
knew it not ; and if he had, it is questionable whether 
it would have made any difference in his official action, 
as he was determined, if possible, to place Missouri 
where he thought she belonged, on the side of the South. 
Accordingly he sent messengers to the Confederate 
authorities at Montgomery, Alabama, asking them to 
supply him with the guns that were needed for the pro- 
posed attack on the arsenal ; and he summoned the 
General Assembly to meet at Jefferson City on the 2d 
of May, to deliberate upon such measures as might be 
deemed necessary for placing the State in a position to 
defend herself. He also ordered, as he was authorized 
to do under the law, the commanders of the several mili- 
tary districts to hold the regular yearly encampments 
for the purpose of instructing their men in drill and 
discipline. And here it is worthy of note, as indicating 
the motives of the people of the State, that the law under 
which this order was issued was introduced into the 
state senate by General Frost in 1855, and was in- 
tended, as he then said, to provide the means for raising 
a volunteer force of fifty thousand men, which was to be 
used in " preventing our Northern and Southern brethren 
from flying at each other's throats, as they will probably 
do at the next presidential election in 1856, or passing 
that, then certainly in 1860, unless the border States take 
action such as this to keep the peace." The bill, we 
are told, was passed, but not until it was shorn of the 
appropriation which alone could give it force, though 
General Simon B. Buckner of Kentucky, who " shared 



THE ARSENAL AND CAMP JACKSON. 301 

in these fears and views as to the means of preventing 
their realization," seems to have had better success, as 
he is said to have " obtained a copy of the law and 
passed it in better shape through the legislature of his 
State." For this curious bit of unwritten history we 
are indebted to General Frost, and chimerical as the 
project may have been, it is of interest as showing that 
the idea of neutrality was by no means of recent origin 
in the border States, and it may help to explain the 
hold which that idea had taken upon a people as com- 
bative as those of Kentucky and Missouri showed them- 
selves to be. 

Returning now to the order for the encampment, we 
find that it was general, though practically its effect was 
limited to the first or Frost's brigade, as that was the 
only one that had been organized under the law. On 
the 3d of May, this little band, numbering less than 
seven hundred men, pitched their tents in a wooded val- 
ley in the outskirts of the city of St. Louis, and named 
it Camp Jackson, in honor of the governor. It is de- 
scribed as being surrounded on all sides, at short range, 
by commanding hills ; it was, moreover, open to a charge 
of cavalry in any and every direction, and the men 
were supplied with but five rounds of ammunition each, 
hardly enough for guard purposes. In a word, it was 
defenseless, and this fact is believed to be conclusive in 
regard to the peaceful character of the camp as it was 
organized. Whatever, then, may have been Jackson's 
motives when he ordered its formation, and there is but 
little doubt that he intended to take advantage of any 
favorable opportunity that might have occurred for 
seizing the arsenal, it is evident that Frost did not, now, 
contemplate any such action. Independently of the fact 



302 MISSOURI. 

that the removal of the arms to a place of safety in 
Illinois had taken away the occasion for such a course, 
he was too good a soldier, had he intended any such 
movement, or had he anticipated an attack from Lyon, 
to have brought his small command within easy striking 
distance of ten times their number of well-armed men ; 
nor would he have encamped in a position in which, 
from the nature of the ground, it was impossible to 
make a successful defense. 

All this was, of course, well known to Lyon, but it did 
not satisfy him of the peaceful character of the camp. 
On the contrary, we are told by his biographer that he 
regarded it as a " fearful menace, which by prompt ac- 
tion would amount to no more than bravado, but if suf- 
fered to continue and grow, would become very shortly 
a source of serious trouble, and might result in terrible 
conflicts in the very streets of the city." These gloomy 
anticipations may or may not have been well founded, 
but in either case it is difficult to understand why Lyon 
should have concerned himself about the matter, since 
he was not a guardian of the peace in St. Louis, and, 
moreover, he was even then engaged in maturing a plan 
that certainly threatened the peace which he seemed so 
anxious to preserve. The times, however, were revolu- 
tionary, as General Scott said when approving of an 
order that gave the Safety Committee power to declare 
martial law in St. Louis ; and in view of the tremendous 
stake for which Blair and Lyon were playing, it would 
have been too much to expect that they could or would 
square their conduct by the rules of logic any more than 
they did by the laws of the State. In their judgment, 
the hour had come when the interests of the Union 
demanded that they should strike down the legally con- 



THE ARSENAL AND CAMP JACKSON. 303 

stituted authorities of the State, and revolutionary as 
was the proceeding, they set about it in a fashion that 
left no doubt as to the thoroughness with which they 
proposed to do the work. 

As a preliminary step, it was determined to seize 
Camp Jackson and every man in it, and hold them as 
prisoners of war. At a meeting of the Safety Commit- 
tee Lyon unfolded this plan, and gave as a reason for 
thinking this course necessary, that a longer delay might 
enable the camp to assume proportions so formidable as 
to endanger the safety of the State. Blair, Broadhead, 
O. D. Filley, and J. J. Witzig agreed with him; but 
Samuel T. Glover and John How, the remaining mem- 
bers of the committee, though desiring the capture of the 
place, objected to the time and manner in which it was 
proposed to take it. The camp, they said, had a legal 
existence but for a week, five days of which had already 
elaj)sed, and they did not think it ought to be attacked 
during that period. Besides, the officers in command of 
it recognized the government of the United States, and 
had in no instance disturbed the peace. True, there 
was property there, believed to have been wrongly taken 
from the government arsenal at Baton Rouge, but the 
way to reach that was by a writ of replevin. If Gen- 
eral Frost refused to respect the writ, the marshal might 
then call upon General Lyon for assistance, and thus the 
object would be gained. 

In reply to this, Lyon urged the impropriety of allow- 
ing Frost to prepare for resistance when the whole en- 
terprise could be managed without the firing of a gun. 
He knew, he said, the camp to be a nest of traitors ; that 
the legislature was in secret session, and even then a new 
military law might be in operation, or, if not, it would 



304 MISSOURI. 

certainly be in a day or so. Advices from all parts of 
the State, he added, were discouraging to the Union 
men, and the rebels were gathering in strength, and he 
closed with the significant warning that General Harney 
would arrive on Sunday (it was now Thursday) and be 
once more in command, and no one could tell what he 
would do. 

The mention of Harney's return and the fear as to 
the effect of his peaceful policy are said to have decided 
Glover, who thereupon agreed to the necessity of break- 
ing up the camp, though he still held to the opinion that 
it would be best to have the United States marshal at 
the head of the attacking column, and let him first make 
a demand for the arms which the Confederate authori- 
ties had forwarded at Jackson's request, and which were 
now, by Frost's permission, and at the earnest solicita- 
tion of Mayor Taylor, deposited outside the front en- 
trance to the camp. Lyon opposed this plan as being 
in the nature of a subterfuge, and in a private consulta- 
tion with Blair he announced his intention of seizing the 
entire force at the camp, without any ceremony other 
than a demand for its surrender. " This demand he 
would make with his men in line of battle and his guns 
in position, and if it was not complied with at once, he 
would fight for it." x The next day — the last of the 
encampment — Frost, who had heard of the proposed 
attack, sent a letter to Lyon, in which he denied that he 
or any part of his command were actuated by hostile 
intentions towards the federal government ; but that 

1 For this account of the meetings of the Safety Committee, 
and for many other facts connected with this most eventful 
period, I am indebted to General Nathaniel Lyon and Missouri in 
1861, by James Peekham. New York, 1866. 



THE ARSENAL AND CAMP JACKSON. 805 

officer, having matured his plans for taking the camp, 
refused to receive it. Frost also notified Glover, How, 
and other members of the Safety Committee, that he 
knew nothing and cared nothing about the arms said to 
have been taken from Baton Rouge and now deposited 
at the entrance to his camp ; that he had no claim on 
them and no orders regarding them, and that if the 
United States marshal wanted them he was welcome 
to come and take them away. These protestations 
were of no avail, as Lyon had made up his mind that 
the time had come for action. He seems to have 
thought, as was said by Blair in his letter to the Presi- 
dent, that to seize Camp Jackson and follow it up " by 
blows struck at the enemy in other parts of the State 
would speedily and effectually, and at small cost of life 
and treasure," crush the rebellion in the State. In this 
he was no doubt correct, though it is probable that the 
result, when achieved, would have been due not so much 
to the u blows" which he proposed to strike, as to the 
fact that except Governor Jackson and his adherents or 
" clique," as Postmaster General Blair styled them, there 
were no rebels in the State. Missouri, it will be remem- 
bered, had just given a majority of eighty thousand 
against secession, and to suppose that the Union men 
of the State could have been duped or driven into an op- 
posite course by less than one fourth of their number is 
preposterous, and it was so considered by those who may 
be said to have been most directly interested. 

Lyon, however, was not to be turned from his purpose 
by such considerations, any more than he was by peaceful 
protestations or legal obstacles. Putting his troops in 
motion early in the morning of the 10th of May, he 
surrounded Camp Jackson and demanded its surrender. 



306 MISSOURI. 

As Frost could make no defense against the overwhelm- 
ing odds brought against him, he was of course obliged 
to comply; and his men, having been disarmed, were 
marched to the arsenal, where they were paroled — all 
except Captain Emmett McDonald, who refused to ac- 
cept his release upon the terms offered, and was finally 
set free by the action of the courts. 

After the surrender, and whilst the prisoners were 
standing in line, waiting for the order to march, a crowd 
of men, women, and children collected and began to 
abuse the home guards, attacking them with stones and 
other missiles. It is even said that several shots were 
fired at them, but this lacks confirmation. According 
to Frost, who was at the head of the column of prison- 
ers, the first intimation of firing was given by a single 
shot, followed almost immediately by volley firing, which 
is said to have been executed with precision considering 
the rawness of the troops. When the fusillade was 
checked, it was found that twenty-eight persons had 
been killed or mortally wounded, among whom were 
three of the prisoners, two women, and one child. In 
justice to the federal troops, it must be added that one 
of them was killed ; and if we may credit Peckham, 
Captain Blandowski, of the third (Sigel's) regiment, 
whose company began the shooting, died the next day 
from the effect of a wound received at the hands of the 
excited crowd before he gave the order to fire. 

Judging this action by the reasons assigned for it, and 
by its effect throughout the State, it must be pronounced 
a blunder. So far from intimidating the secessionists, 
it served only to exasperate them ; and it drove not a 
few Union men, among them General Sterling Price, 
into the ranks of the opposition and ultimately into the 



THE ARSENAL AND CAMP JACKSON. 307 

Confederate army. That Blair and Lyon were honest 
and sincere in what they said is not, for a moment, 
doubted ; but this can hardly be considered as a full 
justification of their conduct. Even after admitting all 
that can be brought forward in their favor and against 
Jackson, there will remain the fact that in seizing the 
camp they were actuated not so much by anything that 
had taken place, as by their fears of what might here- 
after be done. Such an explanation is but a phase of 
the tyrant's plea of necessity, and whilst there are times 
when it is satisfactory, it is not in the present instance, 
for the reason that Blair and Lyon both knew that one 
effort had already been made to detach Missouri from 
the Union, and had failed ; and they had no reason to 
suppose that a second attempt would be any more suc- 
cessful. In taking the course they did, then, they were 
in open, flagrant revolt against the State ; and so far as 
their action was dictated or sanctioned by the authorities 
at Washington, the capture of Camp Jackson was an act 
of war perpetrated by the federal government upon a 
State which was as much a part of the Union as was 
Illinois or Iowa. 

When the news of the seizure reached Jefferson City 
the General Assembly was in secret session ; and if a 
proof of its ill-effect upon the people of the State, or a 
measure of it, be needed, it will be found in the influ- 
ence it exerted upon the members of that body and the 
legislation to which it led. Thus we find that the mili- 
tary bill, as it was called, was then under consideration, 
and that its opponents were contesting its passage, striv- 
ing by every device known to parliamentary warfare to 
deprive it of the features that made it objectionable to 
the Union men. It was the same measure that had 



308 MISSOURI. 

been rejected at the previous session of the legislature ; 
the men who defeated it then were opposing it now, 
and there was no reason to believe that the result would 
have been different ; and yet, such was the revulsion of 
feeling caused by the ill-advised attack upon the state 
troops, that in less than fifteen minutes from the time 
that the news was received, the bill was rushed through 
both branches of the General Assembly in the shape 
in which it had been originally introduced, the amend- 
ments that were intended to render it less objection- 
able having been rescinded. Resolutions denouncing 
the conduct of Blair and Lyon were also passed, and 
the governor was unanimously requested to call out the 
militia for the purpose of defending the State. Other 
and more extreme measures were also adopted, but it is 
unnecessary to specify them, as, owing to the rapid 
march of events, this General Assembly soon ceased to 
be a factor in Missouri politics, and these enactments 
died with it. 

Fortunately for the State, and perhaps for the Union, 
the question of secession was not one of those upon 
which the legislature could take action. That matter 
had been referred to the convention ; and the wisdom 
that led this body, when its ostensible work was fin- 
ished, to take a recess instead of adjourning finally, 
was now fully justified. By adopting this course it was, 
constructively, still in existence, and so long as this 
was the case, the question of the secession of Missouri 
was within its control, and the General Assembly was 
powerless to act in the matter. 

But whilst this was undeniably true, it was equally 
true that there was no reason why the General Assem- 
bly should not arm and equip the state troops, or take 



SECOND MEETING OF THE CONVENTION. 309 

any constitutional measures that might be deemed nec- 
essary to secure the enforcement of the laws ; and this 
was precisely what it claimed to be doing when it au- 
thorized the enlistment of a body of troops to be known 
as the state guard. Under the terms of this law, the 
governor was empowered to appoint a major-general, 
who was to be in command of the entire force, and eight 
brigadier-generals, who were to have control of the sev- 
eral military districts into which the State was divided. 
To the first of these positions Sterling Price, the presi- 
dent of the convention, was apjDointed, and, to the great 
delight of the secessionists, he accepted. Volunteers at 
once began to flock to Jefferson City, and in a week 
from the time that Blair and Lyon had thrown down 
their gage of battle, a regiment was formed, of which 
John S. Marmaduke, the late governor of the State, was 
made colonel. 

Meanwhile General Harney had returned to St. 
Louis and resumed command of the department. He 
approved of the capture of Camp Jackson, and on the 
14th of May he issued a proclamation, in which he an- 
nounced that the whole power of the United States 
would, if necessary, be exerted to maintain the State in 
her present position in the Union. Upon this point he 
was explicit, but beyond this he seems to have had no 
other wish than to preserve the peace. To this end he 
invited General Price to an interview, in which it was 
agreed that the latter officer should be intrusted with 
the duty of keeping order within the State, subject to 
the laws of the general and state governments. If this 
were done, the people were assured by Harney that he 
would have no occasion, as he had no wish, to make 
military movements which might create excitement and 



310 MISSOURI. 

jealousies. In accordance with this agreement, Price 
dismissed the troops which had assembled at Jefferson ■ 
City, though, in reply to a suggestion of Harney, he is 
said to have answered that he had no power to suspend 
the organization of the state guard, as that was carried 
on under a law of the State which must be obeyed until 
it was repealed, or decided to be unconstitutional by com- 
petent authority. 

This agreement which, according to Harney, produced 
a good effect throughout the State, was by no means 
satisfactory to Blair and Lyon. They did not want the 
State to be neutral, nor did they intend that she should 
be. What they wanted was that she should be made to 
fight for the Union ; and as this could not be effected 
whilst Jackson was in authority, they determined to de- 
pose him and drive him from the State. But before 
this could be done it was necessary to get rid of Har- 
ney ; and accordingly they set to work to bring this 
about. A circular signed by 0. D. Filley, one of the 
safety committee, was sent to loyal men throughout the 
State, in which they were asked to write frequently to 
headquarters in St. Louis, and give any information 
they might have as to the organization of troops under 
the military law. They were also asked to forward ac- 
counts of any outrages of which they had cognizancej 
that might be perpetrated by secessionists upon Union 
men ; and they were earnestly recommended, in viola- 
tion, it was claimed, of the Price-Harney agreement, to 
organize " as fast as possible — with arms, if to be had, 
if not, without them." In response to this circular, the 
committee was flooded with letters from all parts of the 
State ; and if we may judge of the whole number from 
those that were published, they were not of a character 



SECOND MEET TNG OF THE CONVENTION. 311 

to entitle them to any great amount of credence. They 
consisted chiefly of rumors that were afterwards proved 
to be false, and inferences based upon them, all of which 
were gravely stated as facts. In one case, — and it is 
a fair sample of all, — a loyal gentleman, writing from 
the southwestern portion of the State, tells us that in 
that region " the people are overwhelmed with terror 
and fright," though he admits that at that time there 
were in the town in which he lived eight hundred home 
guards already mustered into service ; and General 
Sweeny, writing from the same place, six weeks later, 
says that the people in that vicinity were generally loyal, 
and that since his arrival he had organized several regi- 
ments of Union troops. Stories like these were eagerly 
collected, and although General Harney discredited 
them, and on more than one occasion bore official testi- 
mony to the fidelity with which Price was carrying out 
his part of the agreement, yet they had the desired effect 
upon Lincoln, to whom they were duly forwarded. In 
fact, so impressed was he with their truth, and with the 
sufferings and dangers to which the Union men of the 
State were said to be exposed, that he issued an order, 
or rather a series of instructions, in which Harney was 
enjoined to put a stop to " these outrages " by the aid of 
the troops under his command, and with such assistance 
from Kansas, Iowa, and Illinois as he might require. 
He was also told that the state officers were not to be 
trusted ; that the authority of the United States was 
paramount ; and that whenever it was apparent that a 
movement, whether by color of state authority or not, 
was hostile, he must put it down. These instructions 
indicate very plainly the light in which Missouri was 
now regarded at Washington, and the position to which 



312 MISSOURI. 

it was proposed to reduce her ; and they are reproduced 
here simply for that reason, as Harney did not receive 
them until he was no longer in a situation to carry them 
out, the order relieving him of the command having 
been delivered to him by Blair on the 30th of May. 

The dismissal of Harney left Lyon once more at the 
head of the Federal troojjs in Missouri. As his inten- 
tions in regard to the State were well known, both 
sides began to prepare for war ; but before hostilities 
were begun, an effort was made by Thomas T. Gantt, 
William A. Hall, and other well-known citizens to bring 
about an agreement between the rival parties which 
would give a promise of peace to the State. To this 
end a meeting was arranged, and took place in St. 
Louis on the 11th of June, in which Blair, Lyon, and 
Major Conant represented the federal government, and 
Price, Jackson, and Colonel Thomas L. Snead appeared 
for the State, but it came to naught. After some hours 
spent in a fruitless discussion, Lyon, who was still 
seated, closed the interview in the following words, 
spoken " slowly, deliberately, and with peculiar empha- 
sis : ' Rather than concede to the State of Missouri the 
right to demand that my government shall not enlist 
troops within her limits, or bring troops into the State 
whenever it pleases, or move its troops at its own will 
into, out of, or through the State ; rather than concede 
to the State of Missouri for one single instant the right 
to dictate to my government in any matter however un- 
important, I would ' (rising as he said this, and pointing 
in turn to every one in the room) ' see you, and you, 
and you, and you, and you, and every man, woman, and 
child in the State, dead and buried.' Then turning to 
the governor he said. : ' This means war. In an hour 



SECOND MEETING OF THE CONVENTION. 313 

one of my officers will call for you and conduct you out 
of my lines.' And then," continues Snead, " without 
another word, without an inclination of the head, with- 
out even a look, he turned upon his heel and strode out 
of the room, rattling his spurs and clanking his sabre, 
while we, whom he had left, and who had known each 
other for years, bade farewell to each other courteously 
and kindly, and separated — Blair and Conant to fight 
for the Union, we for the land of our birth." 

Returning to Jefferson City, Jackson forthwith issued 
a proclamation in which he announced the result of the 
interview in St. Louis ; spoke of the humiliating con- 
cessions he had been willing to make in order to avert 
the horrors of civil war, of their contemptuous rejection 
by Lyon, and the declaration that the administration 
intended to take military possession of the State and re- 
duce it to the condition of Maryland ; and he closed by 
calling out fifty thousand of the militia for the purpose 
of repelling the attack that had been made upon the 
State, and for the protection of the lives, liberties, and 
property of her citizens. He also sent orders to the 
commanders of the different military districts to assem- 
ble their men and prepare for active service. This 
done, and warned by the rumors of Lyon's approach, he 
left on the 13th of June for Boonville, where he found 
General John B. Clark, with several hundred of the men 
of Marmaduke's regiment, awaiting his arrival. Here 
he determined to make a stand, more to give the state 
troops which had been organized on the north side of 
the river time to join him, than from any expectation 
of being able to hold the place permanently. In fact, 
General Price had already decided that, being without 
artillery and having his men armed only with shotguns 



314 MISSOURI. 

and hunting rifles, it would be impossible for him to 
defend the line of the Missouri ; and consequently he 
had gone to Lexington, to prepare the troops there for 
moving to some jDoint near the Arkansas border, where 
he could organize and equip them under the protection 
of McCulloch and the Confederates. 

In the mean time Lyon was not idle. Having resolved 
upon war, he lost no time in making such a disposition 
of his troops as would enable him to carry it on to the 
best advantage. A brigade, consisting of three regi- 
ments of infantry and two batteries of artillery, under 
the command of General Sweeny, was sent to Spring- 
field, charged with the double duty of watching McCul- 
loch, and of intercepting the retreat of Jackson and the 
state guard, against whom Lyon proposed to march in 
person, and whom he intended if possible to drive back, 
in that direction, out of the State. 

In pursuance of the part of the work he had marked 
out for himself, Lyon set out from St. Louis on the 13th 
of June, the very day that Jackson left Jefferson City. 
On the 15th he took peaceable possession of that place, 
and on the 17th, after a slight skirmish, fought in obe- 
dience to Jackson's order, but against the advice of Mar- 
maduke, he captured Boonville, and obliged the state 
troops to beat a hasty retreat towards the southwestern 
portion of the State. He was, however, in no condition 
to follow up his success, and during the two weeks and 
more that he was detained, reorganizing his command 
and waiting for transportation, etc., Jackson crossed the 
Osage and effected a junction with the troops from 
Lexington, who were also in full retreat, followed by 
Major Sturgis, with nine hundred regulars and two regi- 
ments of Kansas volunteers. 



SECOND MEETING OF THE CONVENTION. 315 

Jackson's force now amounted to between six and 
seven thousand men — a formidable array as then 
reckoned, though practically it was but little better than 
a rabble, being without organization and poorly supplied 
with arms and equipments. A third, perhaps, of the 
men were without guns of any kind, but as an offset, 
they had a surplus of baggage, some of which, as, for 
example, the feather beds and frying pans, were scarcely 
suited to a column in light marching order. 

Continuing his retreat southward, Jackson, on the 
morning of the 5th of July, found his further progress 
barred by a force, consisting of about a thousand men, 
under Colonel Sigel, who had thrown himself in the 
way, for the purpose of holding him in check until Lyon 
and Sturgis could come up and by an attack in the rear 
complete his destruction. The approach of this new 
enemy was a surprise to Jackson, but it did not discon- 
cert him. On the contrary, taking a position on the 
ridge of the prairie, nine miles north of Carthage, he 
awaited the attack of the Federal troops. This was 
promptly begun with artillery, to which the batteries of 
Guibor and Bledsoe replied, apparently without much 
damage to either side. After an hour of this practice, 
Jackson ordered certain changes in the position of his 
troops, which gave Sigel the impression that he was 
about to be surrounded. To prevent this, he ordered a 
retreat, which was well conducted, though he did not 
consider it safe to halt for rest or food until he reached 
Sarcoxie, a town situated fifteen miles beyond Carthage 
on the road to Springfield. The day after the battle, 
Jackson entered Carthage, and here he was met by Gen- 
eral Price, who had preceded him to Arkansas, and at 
whose solicitation McCulloch had crossed the border and 



316 MISSOURI. 

come to the rescue, with several regiments of Confeder- 
ate and Arkansas state troops. Finding that they 
were not in danger of pursuit, for Lyon and Sturgis 
had been delayed by high water in the Osage and other 
streams, McCulloch and Price, who now assumed com- 
mand of the Missourians, moved slowly back, the former 
to his old position near Maysfield, Arkansas, whilst the 
latter pitched his camp on Cowskin Prairie, in the ex- 
treme southwestern corner of the State. Here, as we 
are told by Quartermaster - General James Harding, 
"prairie grass, lean beef, and water," were plentiful, 
though there seems to have been a lamentable scarcity 
of everything else that an army, in active service, is 
usually supposed to need in the way of food and sup- 
plies. 

Price now began in earnest the work of organizing 
and arming his men ; and to any one not familiar with 
the ready methods of the frontier, it must have appeared 
a hopeless task. Powder he had, owing to the fore- 
sight of Governor Jackson, and the Granby mines fur- 
nished him with lead ; but beyond this he had nothing, 
" neither arms nor military stores of any kind, and no 
money to buy them, if any had been for sale." Uni- 
forms were, of course, out of the question, but this diffi- 
culty he obviated by causing bits of red flannel or white 
cotton to be tied around the arms of the officers. To 
add to his perplexities, there were but few trained sol- 
diers with him. Even the officers of his staff, except 
Colonel Little, who left for Washington on the 19th of 
July, were ignorant of their duties. His chief of ord- 
nance, Colonel Snead, who tells the story, " did not 
know the difference between a siege gun and a howitzer, 
and had never seen a musket cartridge." Fortunately, 



SECOND MEETING OF THE CONVENTION. 317 

he had under him men who had served in Mexico 
with Price or Doniphan, or who had passed their 
lives upon the frontier, and were accustomed to meet 
and overcome such difficulties. Major Thomas H. 
Price, for instance, knew how to convert the neighbor- 
ing forest trees into huge bullet moulds, and in a few 
days his improvised ordnance shop turned out bullets 
and buckshot enough to satisfy the immediate wants of 
the command. Guibor, too, whose guns were heard in 
every battle in which the state guard had a part, soon 
had an " arsenal of construction " in working order, 
and with some of Sigel's captured shot as models, was 
busy making cartridges for his cannon. " A turning- 
lathe in Carthage supplied sabots ; the owner of a tin- 
shop contributed straps and canisters ; iron rods which 
a blacksmith gave and cut into small pieces made good 
slugs for the canisters ; and a bolt of flannel, with 
needles and thread, freely donated by a dry-goods man, 
provided us with material for our cartridge bags. A 
bayonet made a good candlestick ; and at night . . . the 
men went to work making cartridges ; strapping shot to 
the sabots, and filling the bags from a barrel of powder 
placed some distance from the candle. . . . My first 
cartridge resembled a turnip rather than the trim cyl- 
inders from the Federal arsenals, and would not enter 
a gun on any terms. But we soon learned the trick, 
and at the close range at which our next battle was 
fought, our home-made ammunition proved as effective 
as the best." 1 

In the quartermaster and commissary departments, 
things were in an equally crude state. General James 

1 Lieutenant Barlow, of Guibor' s battery, in the St. Louis Re- 
publican, of March 1, 1S85. 



318 MISSOURI. 

Harding, the present chairman of the board of railroad 
commissioners of the State, has given an amusing ac- 
count of the difficulties and perplexities that beset him, 
during his career as quartermaster-general of the state 
guard ; and speaking of this very period, he tells us 
with delicious frankness that " we did not have any too 
much to eat, and at one time rations were very scarce, 
and much grumbling was heard in consequence. How 
we got along, I don't know ; more by luck than man- 
agement, probably." 

Of course, in such a dearth of the necessaries of army 
life, and with nothing that could by any possibility be 
termed a camp chest, the men were obliged to serve 
without pay. This did not make much difference, for 
they did not expect any, and consequently they were 
not disappointed. As a rule, they belonged to the well- 
to-do class, were above the average in intelligence and 
education ; and they had joined the guard not from 
any expectation of pay, but from an honest convic- 
tion that the State had been wantonly outraged and 
it was their duty to come to her defense, or else they 
had been led thereto by the determination to stand by 
their Southern friends and relatives in their effort to 
resist invasion. The question of slavery was lost sight 
of altogether, and Snead was probably not far wrong 
when he said that among them all there was not a man 
who would have fired a shot had that been the only 
issue involved. 

Leaving Price to go on with the work of organizing 
his little army, Jackson, on the 12th of July, left for 
Memphis, Tennessee, in order to induce the military 
authorities to send a body of Confederates into Missouri 
strong enough to take possession of the State. It was 



SECOND MEETING OF THE CONVENTION. 319 

not the first time that he had urged such a policy, for 
early in June, before Lyon's declaration of war, he had 
sent Captain Colton Greene to McCulloch's headquar- 
ters at Fort Smith, requesting him to move into Mis- 
souri with his army, for the purpose of encouraging the 
Southern rights people, and of giving Price time to en- 
list and organize the state troops. This was certainly a 
singular request to come from the governor of a State 
which had decided against secession, though, considered 
from a military point of view, there can be no doubt as 
to the advisability of the movement he suggested. In 
fact, so favorably was it regarded that McCulloch ap- 
plied to the Confederate War Department for permission 
to undertake a campaign which was partly based upon 
it. Before he could get an answer, it became necessary 
for him to act, and it was therefore upon his own re- 
sponsibility that, on the 4th of July, he had crossed the 
border and advanced to the support of Jackson, who 
was supposed to be in danger of being caught between 
Lyon and Sigel and so destroyed. 

When, at length, after his return to his camp in the 
Indian Nation, an answer was received to his applica- 
tion, it was found to discourage the idea of a forward 
movement into Missouri. She had not, it was said, se- 
ceded ; and through an absurd adherence, at this most 
inopportune moment, to the doctrine of states' rights, the 
authorities at Richmond let slip the opportunity, and 
failed to make the fight for Missouri at the only time 
when they could have done so with any prospect of suc- 
cess. To McCulloch's request for permission to occupy 
Fort Scott, and thereby overawe southern Kansas and 
encourage the secessionists in that part of Missouri, they 
answered, under date of July 4th, that " the position of 



320 MISSOURI. 

Missouri as a Southern State still in the Union requires, 
as you will readily perceive, much prudence and cir- 
cumspection, and it should only be when necessity and 
propriety unite that active and direct assistance should 
be afforded by crossing the boundary and entering the 
State before communicating with this department." As 
Richmond was a thousand miles from McCulloch's head- 
quarters, and telegraphic communication between the 
two points was not continuous, the propriety of such an 
order may well be questioned. 

During the time that Jackson was in Memphis, en- 
gaged in wdiat proved to be a fruitless undertaking, 
the convention which had been called together by the 
committee appointed for the purpose met at Jefferson 
City. In the two months and more that had elapsed 
since the seizure of Camp Jackson, the exasperation 
caused by that act had measurably subsided, or rather, 
it had given place to a tardy recognition of the fact that 
the two sections of the country were at war ; and that 
divested of extraneous issues, all that Missouri now had 
to do was to adopt such a course as would make her 
adherence to the Union effective. This simplification 
of the issue had necessitated another change of parties, 
and men who but a few months before had ridiculed the 
idea of a Federal invasion of the South were now ready 
to buckle on their swords and take part in such an inva- 
sion. Indeed, so rapid had been the development of the 
Union sentiment that on the 30th of July, the convention 
went to the extreme length of deposing Governor Jack- 
son and appointing Hamilton R. Gamble in his place. 
They also declared vacant the seats of the members of 
the General Assembly, and they formally abrogated the 
laws which had been passed for the purpose, it was 



SECOND MEETING OF THE CONVENTION. 321 

charged, of enabling the governor to carry on a war 
against the general government. 

These were certainly radical measures, but they were 
necessary steps in the revolution then in progress in the 
State, and as such they can be justified. Jackson was 
unquestionably engaged in an attempt to defeat, by 
force, the will of the people as expressed at the Febru- 
ary election, and for this he deserved impeachment and 
removal. Under the circumstances, however, this was 
impossible, and consequently the only way to reach him 
and to put a stop to his intrigues was to depose him. 
This could only be done by a successful revolution, and 
in the condition of affairs which then prevailed, it was 
eminently proper that the convention should take the 
lead in such a movement. But whilst all this is plain 
enough to require no argument, it must be confessed 
that the attempt to invest the proceeding with any legal 
sanction is not so successful. Certainly, if the conven- 
tion had the right to pull down and set up state officers 
who held their positions by the same title as that by 
which the members of the convention held theirs ; and 
if, furthermore, they had the right, during three years, 
to arrogate to themselves the executive and legislative 
powers of the State, so far as the military authorities 
permitted them to do so, there can be no good reason 
why they might not have declared themselves a close 
corporation, with power to govern the State in perpetu- 
ity, and this is absurd. 

Moreover, from the necessities of the case, the com- 
mittee to which was intrusted the task of defending the 
action of the convention were obliged to rest their argu- 
ment upon facts which, if carried to a logical conclu- 
sion, would have brought the State into armed collision 



322 Missouri. 

with the federal government as surely as they had 
done in the case of Governor Jackson. Without going 
into details, it is sufficient to say that the State was "in- 
vaded " by troops from Iowa and Kansas some time be- 
fore the Confederates crossed the boundary. Regarded 
simply as " outrages," the one invasion was as bad as 
the other ; and if " the duty of vindicating the sover- 
eignty of the State " required the convention, in the one 
case, to depose Governor Jackson for inviting the Con- 
federates to enter the State, it is difficult to understand 
why the same sense of duty should not, in the other in- 
stance, have led these same defenders of the doctrine of 
state sovereignty to resent the continued presence of 
troops who had come into the State without an invita- 
tion from any authoritative quarter, and whose illegal 
exactions and arbitrary arrests were the cause of the 
unsettled condition which prevailed in portions of the 
State otherwise unquestionably loyal. 

In thus calling attention to the inconsistency and ille- 
gality that characterized some of the acts of the con- 
vention, it must not be supposed that the writer under- 
rates the importance of the work it performed, or that 
he wishes to detract from the meed of praise to which 
it is so justly entitled. Undoubtedly, those of its ordi- 
nances that partook of a legislative character were il- 
legal and revolutionary, but they were necessary to the 
life of the State, and their illegality and revolutionary 
nature will be overlooked in view of this fact, and be- 
cause it was only by usurping legislative and executive 
powers that the convention was able to preserve the 
machinery of the state government and keep it in mo- 
tion. When Jackson was driven into exile, the State 
was left without a legal official head, and she was in 



SECOND MEETING OF THE CONVENTION. 323 

danger of drifting into anarchy or being reduced to the 
condition of a conquered province and governed by an 
appointee from Washington. In this emergency, the 
convention stepped into the breach, organized a provi- 
sional government, and thereby saved her from the 
threatened dangers. It was a practical and timely as- 
sertion of the principle of self-government, for which the 
convention deserves and should receive the thanks of 
every Missourian. Unconsciously, perhaps, but none 
the less surely, it had removed the only excuse that 
could be found for keeping the State in a condition of 
military subjection, and in so doing, it saved her from 
the pit of political degradation into which the States in 
rebellion were sunk during the period of reconstruction. 



CHAPTER XV. 

SPRINGFIELD AND LEXINGTON : THE CONFEDERATES 
EVACUATE THE STATE. 

For two weeks and more after the occupation of 
Boonville, Lyon was unable to move owing to the want 
of transportation. Even after he started, he was still 
further delayed by high water and the necessity of swerv- 
ing from his direct route in order to effect a junction 
with Major Sturgis, so that he did not reach Springfield 
until the 13th of July. Including Sweeny's command, 
he found himself, upon his arrival here, at the head of 
about seven thousand men. Of this number, some three 
thousand had enlisted for only ninety days, and as their 
term of service would expire on or before the middle of 
August, they could not be depended upon for a longer 
campaign. They were, besides, badly clothed, poorly 
fed, and imperfectly supplied with tents ; none of them 
had been paid, and the three months' volunteers are said 
to have become so disheartened that very few of them 
were willing to reenlist. In view of these facts and the 
rumored approach of Jackson with " not less than thirty 
thousand men," Lyon telegraphed St. Louis, immedi- 
ately on his arrival at Springfield that he must have 
an additional force of ten thousand men or abandon the 
position. 

For various reasons it was impossible to reinforce 
him. In fact not a regiment was ordered forward until 



SPRINGFIELD AND LEXINGTON. 325 

the 4th of August, too late to be of any service ; and 
though General Fremont, who took command of the 
department on the 25th of July, has been severely cen- 
sured for the delay, it is difficult to see how, with the 
other interests committed to his charge, he could have 
acted differently. The battle of Bull Run, it will be 
remembered, had just been fought, and leaving out of 
consideration the necessity which was then supposed to 
exist of hurrying every available man to the defense of 
Washington, it will be sufficient to call attention to the 
fact that upon his arrival in St. Louis, Fremont, with a 
limited force and insufficient means, found himself con- 
fronted by the problem of defending Cairo and the 
mouth of the Ohio, whilst according to the testimony of 
Colonel Chester Harding, Jr., Lyon's adjutant-general, 
the condition of Missouri was such as to make it unsafe 
to withdraw any troops from the sections of the State 
in which they were then stationed. Moreover, Lyon's 
force was as large as any other separate command in the 
department ; and if we may credit the statement that 
Fremont, when told that Lyon intended to fight any- 
way, answered that " he must do it upon his own respon- 
sibility," it would appear that he did not approve of the 
plan of risking a battle when, by a retreat upon Rolla, 
the safety of the command might be insured. Such too 
was evidently the opinion of Lyon's subordinates, and 
was his own, though he afterwards saw fit to change his 
mind without, however, assigning any satisfactory reason 
for so doing. 

In the mean time, whilst Lyon was detained here, 
waiting for the reinforcements which it was impossible 
to furnish, the Confederate authorities at Memphis re- 
solved upon a campaign which embraced the advance of 



326 Missouri. 

a strong column into southeast Missouri for the pur- 
pose either of " taking him in the rear whilst Price and 
McCulloch attacked him in front, or marching upon St. 
Louis, capturing that city, and then sweeping up the Mis- 
souri." This plan would have been feasible enough if 
the Confederates had been in a condition to invade the 
southeastern portion of the State in force. Unfortu- 
nately, however, for the success of their plans, they were 
obliged to convert this proposed movement into a feint ; 
and although it was successful in so far as it prevented 
Lyon from being reinforced, and thus obliged him to 
fight a losing battle, yet it deprived Price, in the advance 
which he subsequently made to the Missouri River, of 
the advantage which would have accrued to him from a 
diversion, such as the march of a heavy column upon St. 
Louis would Jiave caused. 

Of the adoption of this plan and of its abandonment, 
Price and McCulloch were duly informed, but not in 
time to affect their movements ; and being thus left to 
fight the battle at their end of the line according to 
their best judgment, they prepared to march upon Lyon 
without reference to the movement of any correspond- 
ing column. On the 25th of July, Price broke camp 
on Cowskin Prairie and set out for the rendezvous at 
Cassville, a small town situated about forty miles south- 
west of Springfield. There he arrived on the 28th. The 
next day McCulloch came up with 3,200 Confederates, 
and following close behind him was General Pearce with 
2,500 of the Arkansas state troops. These with the 
5,000 armed men under Price swelled the entire force 
available for the march on Springfield to about 11,000, 
in addition to which there were 2,000 unarmed Missou- 
rians, who insisted upon following the army, much to 
McCulloch's disgust. 



SPRINGFIELD AND LEXINGTON. 327 

Informed of the advance of these different commands 
and thinking to strike them in detail, Lyon moved out 
from SJDringfield on the 1st of August at the head of 
5,000 men. The next day, he encountered the advance 
guard of the Confederates, consisting of a part of Rains' 
brigade of Missouri troops, which he easily put to flight. 
It was an insignificant affair, of no material benefit to 
the victors, and yet it is said to have caused McCulloch 
to lose all confidence in the fighting qualities of the 
Missourians. On the morning of the 3d, Lyon ad- 
vanced still further, and took a position within six 
miles of McCulloch's camp. Here he remained for 
twenty -four hours, when fearing lest the Confederates 
might cut off his communications, he fell back upon 
Springfield, arriving there on the evening of Monday 
the 5th. 

Meanwhile there was a total want of harmony in the 
councils of the Confederates, growing out of the fact 
that Price and the Missourians were determined to bring 
on a battle, whilst McCulloch was unwilling to assume 
the offensive, alleging as an excuse that his orders did 
not permit him to move into Missouri except so far as 
it might be necessary for the defense of the Indian 
territory ; and that to advance further into the State 
might endanger that territory and subject him to cen- 
sure. This was a valid excuse, though there is reason 
to believe that it was not the only one. It is in evi- 
dence that he was influenced by his distrust of the Mis- 
sourians, and their officers, and justly enough, he hesi- 
tated about risking a battle so long as the army was 
subject to a divided command. Suspecting the cause of 
his unwillingness to move, Price waived his rank and 
proposed to take a secondary position, though he re- 



328 Missouri. 

served the right of resuming the command of his own 
troops whenever he should think proper to do so. Be- 
ing now at the head of both armies, and having been 
informed of the entry of the Confederates into south- 
east Missouri, McCulloch agreed to attack Lyon ; and 
accordingly he marched at midnight of Sunday the 4th, 
so as to have his men in position by daybreak the next 
morning. Soon after starting he learned that Lyon had 
retreated and was now beyond his reach, but he did not 
allow this to check his advance. He still pushed on, 
and that night he camped at Moody's Spring, twelve 
miles from Springfield. The next morning, he moved 
two miles further and took a position on Wilson's 
Creek, near some fields of corn then in the " roasting 
ear " stage, as " that was to be his main dependence for 
food during the next few days " and until his trains 
could arrive. 

Here the disputes between the Confederate command- 
ers were renewed, Price still urging an advance, whilst 
McCulloch was determined not to make a blind attack, 
as he called it, upon Springfield. According to his own 
account the Missourians failed to furnish him with re- 
liable information as to the strength and position of the 
enemy and the character of the defenses in and around 
Springfield, as he expected them to do, though " to urge 
them he declared that he would lead the whole army 
back to Cassville rather than bring on an engagement 
with an unknown enemy." At length on the 8th, Price 
learned, upon what he considered good authority, that 
Lyon was preparing to abandon Springfield, as Peck- 
ham says he intended doing up to the day before the 
battle. Communicating this information to McCul- 
loch, Price insisted so strenuously upon an advance that 



SPRINGFIELD AND LEXINGTON. 329 

McCulloch agreed to call a council of war. This was 
held at noon of the 9th, and after a stormy scene in 
which Price threatened to take the Missourians and 
with them alone give battle to Lyon, McCulloch yielded, 
and the army was ordered to march at nine o'clock that 
evening. Before that hour it began to rain, and as 
three fourths of the command were without cartridge 
boxes, and would consequently have found it difficult to 
keep their powder dry, the order was countermanded, 
though the men rested upon their arms preparatory to 
a forward movement in the morning. 

Lyon was now sorely perplexed. No reinforcements 
had reached him, and if we may judge from his own 
dispatches and the testimony of his officers, he was at 
a loss whether to retreat or to hold his position until 
driven back. He was even undecided whether, in case 
of retreat, he should fall back upon Rolla, Missouri, or 
Fort Scott, Kansas. At last, being loth to give up the 
Southwest he decided to fight, in opposition, as his biog- 
rapher tells us, to the opinion of his council. Having 
made up his mind to this, he lost no time in carrying 
out his design. On the morning of the 9th, after a con- 
sultation with Sigel, he adopted the hazardous plan of 
dividing his little army in the face of a numerically supe- 
rior force. One of his columns, consisting of 1,200 men 
under Colonel Sigel, was to move to the left or eastward 
of the Cassville road and Wilson's Creek, for the pur- 
pose of turning the Confederate right ; whilst he him- 
self, with 4,200 men, including eight companies of reg- 
ulars and ten pieces of artillery, was to attack the ene- 
my's left, on the west side of the creek. Both of these 
movements were successful, as the Confederate pickets 
had been withdrawn during the night ; and at dawn on 



330 MISSOURI. 

the morning of the 10th, the Southern army lay between 
Sigel and Lyon and in blissful ignorance of their prox- 
imity. Almost the first intimation that the rebel gen- 
erals had of the presence of an enemy was the roar of 
Lyon's guns as he came into position on the west side of 
the creek, followed immediately by the boom of Sigel's 
cannon, as it thundered forth a quick response from the 
other end of the line. 

Breaking up the consultation which, early as it was, 
they were holding, McCulloch hastened to the east side 
of the creek, and put himself at the head of the troops 
that subsequently whipped Sigel and drove back Plum- 
mer ; whilst Price, having ordered the Missourians to 
follow as rapidly as possible, hurried to the front where 
he met Cawthon's brigade which was falling back before 
Lyon, though still " resisting all that it could." By the 
time that he had steadied this brigade, and formed it 
anew under the brow of Bloody Hill and out of the 
range of Totten's cannon, the Missourians began to ar- 
rive on the field. In less than half an hour, 3,100 of 
them, including Guibor's battery of four guns, were in 
position ; and soon afterwards, Churchill's regiment, 
600 strong, of McCulloch's brigade, came up and took 
its place in the line of battle. 

To attack this force Lyon now moved with about 1,900 
men, the rest of his command, except four companies of 
regulars under Captain Plummer, being held in reserve. 
At this time the two armies were concealed from each 
other by the dense growth of underbrush with which 
the hill was covered, though they were so close to each 
other that the order to advance was distinctly heard 
within the Confederate lines. Holding their fire until 
the Union troops had come within easy range, Price's 



SPRINGFIELD AND LEXINGTON. 331 

men opened upon them with shotguns and rifles, " while 
from opposing heights, Totten, who had but lately been 
stationed at Little Rock, where his family still resided, 
fought furiously against Woodruff's battery, which now 
turned against him the very guns that had been taken 
from him a few months before. 

" The battle thus joined upon the hillside was waged 
for hours with intense earnestness. The lines would ap- 
proach again and again within less than fifty yards of 
each other, and then, after delivering a deadly fire, each 
would fall back a few paces to reform and reload, only 
to advance again, and again renew this strange battle in 
the woods. Peculiar in all its aspects . . . the most re- 
markable of all its characteristics was the deep silence 
which now and then fell upon the smoking field . . . 
while the two armies, unseen of each other, lay but a few 
yards apart, gathering strength to grapple again in the 
death struggle for Missouri." * 

By ten o'clock the Confederate regiments that were 
on the east side of the creek, having defeated Sigel 
and driven back Plummer and his regulars, began to 
cross over and hasten to the assistance of Price. Seeing 
the approach of these fresh troops, some of whom had 
not been under fire, Lyon at once ordered forward every 
available battalion. "The engagement," so the Federal 
reports tell us, " now became general, and almost incon- 
ceivably fierce along the entire line, the enemy appear- 
ing in front often in three or four ranks, lying down, 
kneeling, and standing, the lines often approaching 
within thirty or forty yards of each other as the enemy 
would charge upon Captain Totten's battery and be 
driven back." For an hour and more this bloody work 
1 The Fight for Missouri, p. 2*75. 



382 Missouri. 

continued, and it was at this stage of the battle that Lyon, 
while leading a charge, was killed. Soon after his fall, 
there came a lull in the fight, during which Sturgis, who 
succeeded to the command, summoned the principal offi- 
cers to a consultation. The question, we are told, with 
most of them was whether retreat was possible, and so 
doubtful did it then appear, that even while the discus- 
sion was going on, the Federals were called upon to re- 
sist an attack in which the Confederates charged within 
twenty feet of Totten's guns. Fortunately for the cause 
of the Union, the attack was repulsed, and before it was 
renewed, the Federals, unable to hold their ground against 
the increasing force of the enemy, abandoned the field 
and began a retreat which only ended at Rolla. 

This closed the battle. It had lasted about six hours, 
and considering the number of men engaged, and the 
fact that but few of them had ever been under fire, and 
that a large proportion of them were armed with noth- 
ing but shotguns and hunting rifles, it was one of the 
bloodiest, as it was one of the most memorable, conflicts 
of modern times ; of the 5,400 Union men that took part 
in the fight over 1,000 were killed or wounded, whilst 
of the 10,000 Confederates that were actually engaged 
over 1,200 suffered. If to these numbers we add the 
186 Federals, chiefly of Sigel's command, that were 
missing, it will give a total of 2,547 killed, wounded, 
and missing, out of 15,000 actual combatants, or about 
sixteen per cent. But if we limit ourselves to the con- 
test on Bloody Hill, which was to all intents a separate 
battle, it will be found that of the 3,500 Federals and 
4,200 Confederates that were there pitted against each 
other, the former lost 892 and the latter 988 men ; or 
taking both together it will be seen that of the 7,700 



SPRINGFIELD AND LEXINGTON. 333 

men engaged, 1,880, or about twenty-five per cent,, were 
killed or wounded, and this, be it remembered, among 
troops but few of whom had ever fired a shot in anger, 
and almost one half of whom were insufficiently armed. 
Of the Confederates who fought on Bloody Hill. 3,100 
were Missourians and 1,100 Arkansians, and their re- 
spective losses were 680 and 308. On the side of the 
Federals, the first Missouri, Blair's regiment, and Oster- 
haus' battalion bore themselves with equal gallantry. 
Out of 925 men belonging to these two commands, 91 
were killed, 248 wounded, and 11 missing, making a 
total of 350, or about thirty-seven per cent. The Iowa 
and Kansas troops, too, fought equally well ; but of the 
German regiments under Sigel, the same cannot be said. 
When brigaded with other troops the Germans made 
fairly good soldiers, but left to themselves they were 
never able to stand before an equal number of Confed- 
erates, and in this case they were expected to attack a 
superior force. 

As soon as it was known that the Federals were 
leaving the field, McCulloch was urged to pursue them 
vigorously, but this he refused to do, as many of his men 
had fired their last cartridge in the battle, and were con- 
sequently without ammunition. That night, the Federal 
troops evacuated Springfield, and on the 17th they ar- 
rived at Rolla, a somewhat disorganized mass of fugi- 
tives, but with their large and valuable train of three 
hundred and seventy wagons safe. 

A few days after the battle, General Price called on 
McCulloch and proposed to him to cooperate in a march 
to the Missouri River. This McCulloch declined, alleg- 
ing first his orders, which made the defense of the Indian 
Nation his primary consideration ; secondly, the scarcity 



334 Missouri. 

of ammunition ; and thirdly, the fact that the force in- 
tended for the invasion of southeast Missouri had been 
obliged to fall back, and consequently he could not 
reckon upon a diversion in that quarter. To a Confed- 
erate officer, as McCulloch was, the first of these reasons 
was, of course, sufficient ; and accordingly he led his 
brigade back to their camp in the Indian country, whilst 
the Arkansas State troops, under General Pearce, re- 
turned homeward. Price, however, was not to be de- 
terred from his expedition to the Missouri, and on the 
25th of August he set out from Springfield on the cam- 
paign which resulted in the capture of Lexington. 

Proceeding northward as far as Bolivar, Polk County, 
he turned sharply to the west, for the purpose, as he tells 
us, of " chastising " Senator General James H. Lane and 
his brigade of freebooters, who had already begun that 
career of robbery, arson, and murder, which converted 
Lawrence, Kansas, into a mere fence-house for stolen 
property, and led, in August, 1863, to the sack of that 
town, and the massacre of 183 of its inhabitants by 
Quantrell's band of guerrillas. 

Having driven Lane and his doughty warriors out of 
the State and away from Fort Scott, and thus secured his 
flank from attack, Price continued his march northward, 
and on the 13th of September, he sat down before Lex- 
ington with his advance guard of mounted men. By the 
18th, his ammunition wagons and the rest of his forces 
arrived, and he then began the attack on the place in 
earnest. After fifty-two hours of firing it was surren- 
dered, the garrison having been cut off from their supply 
of water. The loss on either side was trifling, owing to 
the fact that the Union troops were entrenched, whilst 
the Confederates made movable breastworks of bales 



SPRINGFIELD AND LEXINGTON. 835 

of hemp, under shelter of which they approached the 
enemy's works with comparative impunity. 

According to General Price, the fruits of this almost 
bloodless victory consisted of 3,500 prisoners, 5 pieces of 
artillery, over 3,000 stand of arms, 750 horses, about 
$100,000 worth of commissary stores and a large amount 
of other property. He also obtained the restoration of 
$900,000 in money which had been taken from the bank, 
and he recovered the great seal of the State and the pub- 
lic records, which are said to have been stolen from their 
proper custodian. 

During the two weeks and more that Price was at 
Lexington, his force was considerably augmented by re- 
cruits, many of whom were from the north side of the 
river, though the increase was nothing like as great as 
was reported. Instead of 60,000, there were probably 
never more than from 15,000 to 18,000 men in and about 
his camp, including hundreds who had come to see the 
fight, just as they would have gone to a country fair. 
Of this number, 11,000 may have started with him when 
he began his retreat ; but so numerous were the deser- 
tions during the next ten days, that it is doubtful whether, 
at any time after crossing the Osage, he could have mus- 
tered 7,000 men for duty. As this force was never ma- 
terially increased, there is no reason to believe that dur- 
ing the year and more that the Missouri state guard 
was in existence, it was ever stronger than at Wilson's 
Creek ; and there, as we have seen, it numbered 7,000 
men, 2,000 of whom were unarmed. After crossing the 
Osage, Price, no longer in fear of pursuit, moved leisurely 
southward and took up a position in the southwestern 
portion of the State, where he was in easy communication 
with McCulloch, and could, at the same time, protect the 



336 Missouri. 

General Assembly which had been summoned by Gov- 
ernor Jackson to meet in extra session at Neosho, on 
the 21st of October. 

Of the proceedings of this body it is unnecessary to 
speak in detail. It was a mere rump, — not a quorum of 
either house being present, — and consequently its acts 
were irregular and of no legal force. Moreover, it had 
relinquished the power of legislating upon the subject of 
secession to the convention, which was still in session, 
though this fact was conveniently ignored, and an act was 
passed which purported to dissolve the ties existing be- 
tween the State of Missouri and the United States of 
America. For purposes of its own, the Confederate 
government saw proper to regard this action as valid, 
and on the 28th of November Missouri was formally ad- 
mitted into the Confederacy, though it was now too late 
to make the fight for her with any prospect of success. 
In fact, it was whilst the few members, present at this 
meeting of the General Assembly, were playing at legis- 
lation that Fremont, whose pursuit of Price had been 
delayed by the want of transportation, arrived at Spring- 
field with a well-appointed army of forty thousand men. 
His purpose, so it was stated, was to force the Confeder- 
ates to a battle, and in case of success, of which he had 
no doubt, he then proposed to sweep down upon Little 
Rock, Memphis, and ultimately New Orleans. Unable 
to stand before this overwhelming force, McCulloch was 
preparing for a retreat into Arkansas, when on the 2d 
of November Fremont was relieved from the command 
of the army which he may be said to have created. A 
few days afterwards, in obedience to a suggestion from 
President Lincoln, General Hunter, who had succeeded 
to the command, fell back upon Rolla and Sedalia. 



SPRINGFIELD AND LEXINGTON. 337 

Of course this retrograde movement again uncovered 
the entire Southwest, and Price and his half-clothed and 
half-fed Missourians were not slow to avail themselves 
of the opportunity of returning. For a few months, 
now, they lived at their ease. Their quarters were com- 
fortable, forage was abundant, their food was plentiful 
and of the best, and money, such as it was — state 
" scrip " and Confederate notes — circulated freely and 
apparently without any fears as to its future value. A 
Confederate veteran, to whose account of the state guard 
I have repeatedly had occasion to refer, tells us that 
often during the years 1863-64, when on duty in South 
Carolina, and living on rice, molasses, and sweet potatoes, 
"which were served with commendable regularity twenty- 
one times per week," his mind would revert to the " flush 
times " at Springfield, and he would long for the scraps 
that then fell from his table. 

These halcyon days were not to last. On the 13th 
of February, General Curtis, with twelve thousand men, 
was so near Springfield that Price, who had delayed 
evacuating the place in the hope that McCulloch would 
come to his assistance and enable him to risk a battle, 
was obliged to beat a hurried retreat into Arkansas. 
Shortly after passing the state line, the Confederates 
were met coming to the rescue ; and the meeting was 
made memorable by the fact that the 3d Louisiana had a 
Confederate battle-flag, the first that the Missouri troops 
had seen. Although the combined force of Price and 
McCulloch was fully as numerous as that which was 
pursuing them, yet they continued to fall back until they 
reached Cove Creek, in the Boston Mountains, twenty 
miles beyond Fayetteville. Here they halted, and here 
they were on the 2d of March when Van Dorn arrived 
and took the command. 



338 Missouri. 

Including Pike's brigade of Indians and half-breeds, 
the Confederates now numbered about fourteen thousand 
available men, and with this force Van Dorn turned on 
Curtis, who occupied a fortified position on Pea Ridge, 
near the Elkhorn tavern, with ten thousand five hundred 
men. After a conflict which lasted through portions of 
the 6th, 7th, and 8th of the month, the Confederate at- 
tack was repulsed and the Union army was left in pos- 
session of the field. In this contest the Missourians, in- 
cluding those who had entered the Confederate service 
as well as the state guard, numbered about six thousand 
eight hundred men, six thousand of whom were actively 
engaged. They formed the left wing of the army, and 
are said to have borne the brunt of the battle. From 
the first shot to the last, according to Van Dorn's offi- 
cial report, " they continually pushed on, never yielded 
an inch they had won, and when at last they received 
the order to fall back " — an order made necessary by 
the deaths of McCulloch and Mcintosh, the capture of 
Hubert, and the defeat of the Confederate right wing — 
" they retired steadily and with cheers," thinking it only 
a change of position. 

After some two weeks given to rest and reorganiza- 
tion, Van Dorn moved with the Missourians and a 
large part of his other troops to Des Arc, a town on 
White River in the eastern portion of the State, where 
he arrived on the 7th of April. The next day, General 
Price published an order, in which he bade farewell to 
the state guard. Shortly after, he was transferred to 
the other side of the Mississippi, with about five thou- 
sand of the Missouri troops, who had followed him 
into the Confederate service. On their arrival at Beau- 
regard's headquarters near Corinth, Mississippi, they 



CONFEDERATES EVACUATE THE STATE. 339 

were joined by a number of their fellow-citizens, and 
together they organized the famous 1st and 2d Missouri 
Confederate brigades. Including the six batteries that 
had crossed the river with them, and allowing to each 
regiment and battery its full complement, they may 
have numbered ten thousand men. This is an outside 
estimate ; and as these brigades were never in a position 
to increase their strength, it is not probable that the 
Missouri Confederates, serving on the east side of the 
Mississippi, ever exceeded the number here given. Of 
the subsequent career of this gallant band it is not my 
province to speak, though the story of their courage, 
their endurance, and their devotion to the cause of the 
South has been well told, and the record is one of which 
every Missourian may feel proud. Let it suffice to say 
that on the 5th of July, 1861, they had fought their 
first battle at Carthage, Missouri, and on the 9th of April, 
1865, the very day on which Lee surrendered, these 
brigades, now consolidated and reduced to a mere skele- 
ton scarcely four hundred strong, fired their last gun at 
Fort Blakeley on the shores of the Gulf of Mexico. 

With the admission of Missouri into the Confederacy 
and the transfer of so many of her troops to that service, 
the organization of the state guard virtually came to an 
end. Thereafter, the Missourians who " went South " and 
entered the Confederate army, were known as Confeder- 
ates not as state troops, and to this extent lost their 
individuality, though in their regimental and brigade 
organizations they were still credited to the State. Of the 
number who, during the next three years, left their 
homes and in the face of grave dangers made their way 
to the Confederate army, it is impossible to speak with 
certainty. According to an estimate furnished by Gen- 



340 MISSOURI. 

eral James Harding, they did not exceed six regiments 
of infantry, ten of cavalry, and eight batteries. Allow- 
ing to each regiment its full complement of one thou- 
sand men, and to each battery one hundred, it would 
give sixteen thousand eight hundred as the total num- 
ber of Missourians on the west side of the river ; or, 
making every allowance for subsequent increase by re- 
cruiting, they may have amounted to twenty thousand. 
This is a liberal estimate, and if we add to it the ten 
thousand that were east of the river, it will swell the 
grand total to thirty thousand, and this, it is believed, 
will cover all the men that Missouri contributed to the 
Confederate service. 

Contrasted with the magnificent array of one hun- 
dred and nine thousand men, including eight thousand 
colored troops, whom she sent into the Union army, the 
Southern contingent is small ; but if we consider it with 
reference to the Breckinridge vote in the autumn of 
1860, or if we compare it with the secession vote for 
members of the convention in February, 1861, it will be 
found to amount, practically, to a levy en masse. More- 
over, it was composed of the best material in the State, 
consisting in good part of men who served without other 
hope of reward than that which comes from the con- 
scientious discharge of a duty, and of others, and they 
were not a few, who were driven into the rebel ranks 
by outrages perpetrated upon them by the military au- 
thorities. Under the lead of Price, Marmaduke, and 
Shelby, these men were always ready for a raid into 
the State, and though they were never able to reestablish 
themselves upon her soil, yet such was their activity 
that they succeeded in keeping much of the region south 
of the Missouri in a constant state of turmoil and ex- 



CONFEDERATES EVACUATE THE STATE. 841 

citement. In the end they shared the fate of the Con- 
federacy, and of the army of which they formed a part. 
Step by step they were driven back, until, at the close 
of the rebellion, they were massed upon the line of Red 
River, and not in the Ozark Mountains and upon the 
Arkansas. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

FROM THE EVACUATION OF THE STATE TO THE END 
OF THE WAR. 

Although the Confederates were never able to recover 
the ground which they lost in the early part of 1862, 
when they were driven from Springfield and forced to 
evacuate New Madrid, it would be a mistake to suppose 
that the advance of the Federals and the military rule 
which they established were followed by a restoration of 
peace and order. So far were they from it, that, prob- 
ably, but few months elapsed during the four years that 
the war lasted, in which there was not an outbreak of 
some sort in some part of the State. According to the 
official records, between the 20th of April, 1861, the 
date of the capture of the Federal arsenal at Liberty, 
Missouri, and the 20th of November, 1862, — a period 
of nineteen months, — over three hundred battles and 
skirmishes were fought within the limits of the State. Of 
the number that took place during the last two years of 
the war it is not possible to speak with accuracy, but it 
is probable that there were half as many more ; and it 
may be said of them that they were relatively more de- 
structive of life, as by this time the contest had degen- 
erated into a disgraceful internecine struggle. In many, 
perhaps a large majority, of these skirmishes, especially 
those that occurred in the northern half of the State, the 
combatants on the side of the Confederates were regu- 



THE END OF THE WAR. 343 

larly enlisted soldiers, who were endeavoring to make 
their way south. Theoretically, this ought to have been 
impossible, for all this region was within the Federal 
lines, but practically there never was a time when, in 
spite of martial law and the formidable barrier which 
the Missouri offered to those going south, a rebel re- 
cruiting officer could not have been found on the north 
side of the river by any one who was anxious to do so. 
In the last great raid into the State, the one led by Price 
in person in the autumn of 1864, he is said to have 
been joined by over five thousand recruits. 

Facts like these indicate a deep-seated spirit of dis- 
content ; and to account for it we shall have to trust to 
other influences than those that sprung from sympathy 
with the people of the South and the cause for which they 
fought. Unquestionably this sympathy, founded upon 
political considerations and strengthened by ties of blood, 
was chiefly instrumental in sending into the Southern 
army the men who followed Price and Jackson at the 
outset of the war. It will not, however, explain the out- 
break which took place in the summer of 1862, nor will 
it account for the fact that as late as the autumn of 
1864, Missouri, though still overwhelmingly true to the 
Union, was in as unsettled a condition as she had been 
at any time since the capture of Camp Jackson. 

Probably, the one measure which, more than all 
others, contributed to the above-mentioned outbreak, 
was the order of Governor Gamble enrolling the entire 
fighting population of the State, and authorizing Gen- 
eral Schofield to call such portion of it into active ser- 
vice as might be deemed necessary to put down all 
marauders and preserve the peace. The order was 
somewhat indefinite; it was generally supposed to be 



344 Missouri. 

preliminary to a draft, and it was looked upon by the 
Southern sympathizers as betraying an intention on the 
part of the state and federal authorities to force them 
into the army and make them fight against their friends 
and relatives in the South. They also regarded it as a 
violation by the State of the implied bargain which had 
been entered into when they were disarmed and obliged, 
under penalty of arrest and imprisonment, to take an 
oath not to bear arms against the United States or the 
provisional government of Missouri, and to give a bond 
for the faithful observance of the oath. They held, and 
with some measure of justice, that in exacting this bond, 
as had been generally done throughout the State, the 
government had recognized them as non-combatants ; 
and they resolved that if they must take a part in the 
war, they would choose the side upon which they were 
to fight. Hence, as General Schofield admits, the first 
effect of this measure was to cause every rebel who could 
possess himself of a weapon to spring to arms, " whilst 
thousands of others ran to the brush to avoid the required 
enrollment." 

Another measure of more or less influence in mould- 
ing public opinion was the Emancipation Proclamation 
of January 1, 1863 ; not that it applied directly to Mis- 
souri, or that it can be said to have weakened the Union 
sentiment among the great mass of the people, but for the 
reason that it gave rise to serious differences among the 
Union men, and, in the opinion of not a few, it removed 
the contest from the high plane upon which it had hith- 
erto been conducted, and reduced it to the level of mere 
party politics. To understand this, it is necessary to 
bear in mind that the proclamation, or rather the over- 
throw of slavery which it brought about, was in direct 



THE END OF THE WAR. 845 

violation of the assurances upon which the federal gov- 
ernment had thus far carried on the contest ; and whilst 
as a war measure it was clearly justifiable, it was looked 
upon as introducing new and different issues into the 
struggle, and as involving the exercise of a power for 
which there was no warrant in the Constitution. From 
this point of view it was open to criticism, and that it 
was so considered by President Lincoln himself is evi- 
dent from the answer he returned to a delegation of 
Missouri radicals who visited Washington for the pur- 
pose, among others, of insisting upon the immediate 
abolition of slavery in the State, in preference to the 
scheme of gradual emancipation which the convention 
had recently adopted. Speaking of the political situa- 
tion in Missouri at this time, Lincoln said that it was a 
" perplexing compound " of Union and slavery, " even 
among those who were for the Union, to say nothing of 
those who were against it." Thus there were " those 
who were for the Union with but not without slavery ; 
those for it without but not with ; those for it with or 
without, but prefer it with ; and those who are for it 
with or without, but prefer it without. Among these, 
again, is a subdivision of those who are for gradual but 
not for immediate, and those who are for immediate but 
not for gradual, extinction of slavery." These different 
opinions, he continued, might be honestly entertained 
by loyal men, and this would, of course, give rise to dif- 
ferent ideas as to the proper way of sustaining the 
Union. For this reason, then, he declined to accede to 
the changes upon which the radical delegation thought 
proper to insist, and in so doing he preserved to the 
people of the State the small remnant of self-govern- 
ment which had been left them. In concluding his 



346 Missouri. 

answer, and apparently by way of emphasizing his posi- 
tion, he says in his terse and pointed way : " The radi- 
cals and conservatives each agree with me in some 
things and disagree in others. I could wish both to 
agree with me in all things ; for then they would agree 
with each other, and would be too strong for any foe 
from any quarter. They, however, choose to do other- 
wise, and I do not question their right. I, too, shall do 
what seems to be my duty. I hold whoever commands 
in Missouri or elsewhere responsible to me, and not to 
either radicals or conservatives." 

Potent as this measure may have been in separating 
men of conservative views from sympathy with the na- 
tional administration, its influence was but slight when 
compared with that exerted by the constant interfer- 
ence of the military with unoffending citizens, especially 
with those who were suspected of rebel tendencies. To 
enumerate all the different shapes which this interfer- 
ence took were an idle task. Even after leaving out 
those cases that affected the entire community, and con- 
fining ourselves to those that involved crimes against a 
class or against individuals, they will be found to run 
through the entire gamut, — ranging from the arbitrary 
arrest and imprisonment of men and women for mere 
opinion's sake, to the murder of prisoners ; from the 
illegal requisition for unnecessary supplies by irrespon- 
sible parties, to robbery, pillage, and arson. 

To a great extent these lawless proceedings were in 
violation of orders, and it would therefore be unjust to 
hold the department commanders or the administration 
at Washington responsible for them. They were the 
acts of subordinates, and it is but fair to add, that, as a 
rule, they resulted from ignorance and an excess of zeal. 



THE END OF THE WAR. 347 

rather than from a spirit of wantonness or the desire of 
personal gain. By some curious process, the average 
military officials, especially those from other States, 
appeared to have satisfied themselves that Missouri was 
disloyal ; and acting upon this conviction, and ignorant, 
perhaps, of the fact that there was such a thing as mili- 
tary law, they not unfrequently conducted themselves in 
a manner that would hardly have been justifiable in an 
enemy's country. Instead of discharging the delicate 
duties of their office in such a way as to give as little 
offense as possible, they acted as if it were the policy to 
exasperate the people among whom they were stationed, 
and drive them into the rebel army, or, worse still, into 
some wild and predatory band of guerrillas. In this, 
unfortunately for the peace of the State, they were too 
often successful. 

But whilst it is easy to acquit the ruling authorities, 
civil as well as military, of complicity in outrages com- 
mitted in defiance of orders, and of which they had no 
knowledge, it is not possible to absolve them from blame 
for those which they themselves perpetrated, or which 
were committed with their knowledge, and presumably 
with their approval. Take, for example, the outrages 
on the western frontier of the State, — those perpetrated 
by Union troops and Kansas Red-Legs upon Missou- 
rians, as well as those committed by guerrillas and out- 
lawed Missourians upon the people of Kansas, — and, 
either as sins of omission or commission, they can be 
traced directly to mismanagement on the part of the 
Federal authorities. 

Without stopping to enlarge upon the crimes of Lane 
and his brigade, to which reference has already been 
made, it is sufficient to say that in 1861 they burned the 



348 Missouri. 

town of Osceola, " an enterprise in which large amounts 
of property and a score of lives were sacrificed ; " that 
they " cleaned out " the villages of Butler and Park- 
ville ; and, in a word, that they began in Missouri the 
work of robbery and murder which resulted in depopu- 
lating a large part of the western border. Following in 
the wake of this brigade of " thieves and marauders," as 
Governor Robinson is said to have called them, came the 
bands of robbers known as Red-Legs, whose custom 
it was " at intervals to dash into Missouri, seize horses 
and cattle, — not omitting other and worse outrages on 
occasion, — then to repair with their booty to Lawrence, 
where it was defiantly sold at auction." These depre- 
dations were well known to the authorities. In Decem- 
ber, 1861, General Halleck, who seems to have been 
powerless to remedy the evil, wrote to McClellan that 
" the conduct of our troops during Fremont's campaign, 
and especially the course pursued by those under Lane 
and Jennison, has turned against us many thousands who 
were formerly Union men ; " and on another occasion, 
when speaking of the rumor that Lane had been made a 
brigadier-general in the Federal army, he added that such 
an appointment u is offering a premium for rascality 
and robbing generally," and that " it will take twenty 
thousand men to counteract its effect in the State." 
This letter was seen by President Lincoln, who did noth- 
ing to bring about a different state of affairs on the bor- 
der, though he signified his regret that Halleck should 
have entertained such an unfavorable opinion of Lane. 

If, now, we reverse the shield, we shall find that the 
outrages of Lane and the Red-Legs not only sent a num- 
ber of men into the Southern army, but that they also 
drove others into adopting the lawless mode of life 



THE END OF THE WAR. 349 

known as " bushwhacking." The number of those 
who thus outlawed themselves was never large, certainly 
not a tenth of the force that might at any moment have 
been brought against them, and yet such was the ineffi- 
ciency of the Federal authorities that these guerrillas, 
aided -by certain hangers-on to the Confederate army, 
are said to have carried on a savage and, we may add, 
a seemingly successful predatory war with the Union 
troops, as well as with their freebooting neighbors over 
the border. This result was clearly foreseen by Gov- 
ernor Charles Robinson of Kansas. As early as Sep- 
tember, 1861, he warned Fre'mont that there was danger 
that " Lane's brigade will get up a war by going over 
the line, committing depredations, and then returning 
into our State." In such an event the secessionists, he 
said, will be forced to retaliation, " and in this they 
will be joined by nearly all the Union men of Missouri." 
In the same letter in which he utters this warning he 
bears testimony to the peaceful disposition then prevail- 
ing among the Missourians. " There are," said he, 
" small parties of secessionists among them, but we have 
good reason to know that they do not intend to molest 
Kansas. . . . Indeed, a short time since, when a guer- 
rilla party came over and stole some property from our 
citizens, the officers in command of the Confederates 
compelled a return of the property, and offered to give 
up the leader of the gang to our people for punishment. 
... If you will remove the supplies at Fort Scott to 
the interior," he adds, " and relieve us of the Lane 
brigade, I will guarantee Kansas from invasion . . . until 
Jackson shall drive you from St. Louis." 

Unfortunately for the peace of the border, neither 
the protests of Robinson and Halleck, nor the example 



350 MISSOURI. 

of the Confederates in offering to give up a guerrilla, 
were of any avail. The Kansas marauders were per- 
mitted to continue their depredations without any seri- 
ous effort on the part of the Federal authorities to 
put a stop to them, and this course, as had been fore- 
told, led to savage reprisals. In August, 1863, a band 
of outlawed Missourians, maddened by the atrocities 
that were committed on their people, made a descent 
upon Lawrence, Kansas, burned the town, and slaugh- 
tered one hundred and eighty-three of its inhabitants. 
" Jennison has laid waste our homes," was the declara- 
tion of more than one Missourian on the day of the 
massacre, " and the Red-Legs have perpetrated unheard- 
of crimes. Houses have been plundered and burned, 
defenseless men shot down, and women outraged. We 
are here for revenge — and we have got it." 1 

This savage butchery, indefensible even upon the 
score of retaliation, aroused the military authorities to a 
sense of their shortcomings ; and on the 25th of August, 
only four days after the massacre, General Thomas 
Ewing issued an order, which may have been intended 
to put an end to the disgraceful warfare that had grown 
up in this district, but which, considered as a military 
measure, was, fortunately, without a parallel in Missouri. 
Instead of obliging the Kansas robbers to stay on their 
own side of the border, and using the troops at his com- 
mand to drive out or exterminate the " bushwhackers," 
as there is reason to believe he might have done, and as 
certainly would have been done by any one who really 
desired to give peace to the border, General Ewing is- 
sued an order, in the execution of which, those of the 
inhabitants of Jackson, Bates, Cass, and a part of Ver* 
1 Spring's Kansas, p. 287. 



THE END OF THE WAR. 351 

non counties, who were so unfortunate as to live outside 
of certain limits, were driven from their homes, their 
dwellings burned, their farms laid waste, and the great 
bulk of their movable property handed over, without 
let or hindrance, to the Kansas " jayhawkers." It was 
a brutal order, ruthlessly enforced, and so far from 
expelling or exterminating the guerrillas, it simply 
handed this whole district over to them. Indeed, we 
are assured by one who was on the ground, that from 
this time until the end of the war, no one wearing the 
Federal uniform dared risk his life within the devas- 
tated region. 

The only people whom the enforcement of the order 
did injure were some thousands of those whom it was 
Ewing's duty to protect. They were ruined ; and if 
possible the enormity of the outrage upon them was in- 
creased by the fact that, fourteen years later, General 
Schofield, who had approved of the order, justified his 
action on the ground that they were mere furnishers 
of supplies to the guerrillas, when in point of fact, 
tried by any known standard, they were as loyal to the 
Union as were their neighbors in Kansas. They had 
voted against secession ; they had not only, thus far, 
kept their quota in the Union army full, and that with- 
out draft or bounty, but they continued to do so ; and 
if they did not protect themselves against the outrages 
alike of Confederate bushwhackers and Union jay- 
hawkers, it was because early in the war they had been 
disarmed by Federal authority, and were consequently 
without the means of defense. But it is unnecessary 
to pursue this subject further. Considered as a military 
measure, the only light in which we are privileged to 
regard it, this order was, as General Blair truly said, 



352 Missouri. 

an act of imbecility — a confession on the part of the 
Federal commander that he was unwilling or unable 
to put down the bushwhackers — which should have cost 
him his command ; and neither General Schofield's nor 
President Lincoln's approval of the measure can change 
its character, though it may divide the odium. 

A wholesale spoliation of this character was hardly 
calculated to make many converts among the secessionists 
proper, and as it did not commend itself to the great 
mass of the Union people, and utterly failed to give 
peace to the district in which it was tried, it was not 
repeated elsewhere. There were, however, other methods 
of confiscation, less brutal, perhaps, but equally unjust, 
that were practiced, and always with the same evil re- 
sult. Among them, the favorite seems to have been to 
assess the Southern sympathizers for damage done by 
bushwhackers and Confederate raiders, or for the pur- 
pose of raising a fund to be used in the support of 
Union refugees and for other purposes. Of the injus- 
tice of such a proceeding it is needless to speak. The 
people who were thus called upon to make good these 
losses, or contribute to the charities which the govern- 
ment should have maintained, were in no manner re- 
sponsible for the injuries which they were called upon to 
repair. Even if they had known of them, they could 
not have prevented them ; and yet so popular was this 
method of raising money, that, in August, 1862, the 
Southern sympathizers in St. Louis County were ordered 
to be assessed in the sum of five hundred thousand 
dollars for the purpose of arming the state militia and 
supporting the families of such militiamen and United 
States volunteers as might be left destitute. As if to 
add absurdity to injustice, it was furthermore proposed 



THE END OF THE WAR. 853 

to grade this assessment not only according to the wealth 
of the individual, but according to the supposed degree 
of his sympathy with the South. In other words, it was 
proposed, in a community in which all shades of opinion 
existed, to establish a dividing line between loyalty and 
disloyalty, and to fix the rates of payment of those 
who fell below the standard ; and this was to be done 
not by an open trial, and the examination of witnesses 
under oath, but by a board sitting in secret session and 
obliged, from the nature of the case, to rest its deci- 
sions upon vague rumors, hearsay evidence, and general 
impressions. That such a proposition could have been 
seriously entertained, or that worthy citizens could have 
been found who were willing to undertake the duties of 
this office, is almost incredible at this late day ; but it 
illustrates very clearly the spirit that then ruled in some 
of the border States. Fortunately for the good name of 
the State, the Rev. Dr. William G. Eliot, a loyal clergy- 
man of St. Louis, called President Lincoln's attention 
to the injustice and iniquity of this measure, and it 
was countermanded. The disapproval of this particular 
order of assessment, however, did not put an end to the 
evil. It continued to flourish, and so serious did it 
finally become that Governor Gamble, in December, 
1862, forbade the militia of the State to aid in carrying 
out any of these assessments, thus depriving the pro- 
vost marshals of the services of these troops, and to 
some extent putting an end to the practice. 

Amongst the other and more general forms in which 
this interference of military with the civil administration 
manifested itself, may be mentioned the restrictions that 
were placed upon trade and commerce, and the presence 
of soldiers at the polls. With the first of these measures 



354 Missouri. 

we need not concern ourselves. It was a serious incon- 
venience to the people of the State, loyal as well as dis- 
loyal, and a positive injury to many ; but it was regarded 
as a necessary precaution, and hence it was willingly 
borne even by those who suffered most from its enforce- 
ment. 

The second of these measures cannot be dismissed 
in this summary fashion. The presence of soldiers at 
the polls is never a pleasant sight to a people accus- 
tomed to self-government, and in the present instance 
it was made more objectionable by the fact that the 
reason assigned for it was not sufficient, and because 
it involved an unnecessary display of force for the pur- 
pose of carrying out an unnecessary and, so far as it par- 
took of the nature of an ex post facto law, an illegal 
ordinance. There were never any grounds for suppos- 
ing that those who were disfranchised by the ordinance 
of June, 1862, would attempt to vote ; and even if they 
had been allowed to do so, there was not the slightest 
probability of their carrying the election. To intimate, 
then, that the soldiers were permitted at the polls for the 
purpose of preserving order and preventing intimidation, 
is to assert that the loyal voters of the State, although 
they outnumbered the disloyal in the proportion of two 
or three to one, would not preserve order, and could be 
so far intimidated as to prevent their voting. Such a 
thing might have been possible at some outlying pre- 
cinct, or in some guerrilla-infested neighborhood ; but to 
admit it of the State at large is to cast a reflection upon 
the Union men which is certainly undeserved. Never- 
theless it is the explanation which the order, relating to 
the election of November, 1862, was made to give of 
itself ; and whilst it would hardly be fair, for the reason 



THE END OF THE WAR. 355 

just given, to characterize it as untrue, it would be ob- 
viously unsafe to accept it as the whole truth. This will 
be found in the evident determination of the authorities 
to enforce the ordinance of the convention, which made 
an oath of loyalty to the United States and the provi- 
sional government of Missouri a condition precedent to 
voting. In other words, soldiers were encouraged to be 
at the polls not so much for the purpose of preventing 
any person from being intimidated, as of intimidating 
any one who might attempt to vote without having taken 
the prescribed oath. In the language of the order, they 
were " to see that no person is either kept from the polls 
by intimidation, or in any way interfered with in voting 
at the polls for whatever candidate he may choose," 
though in a previous clause they were virtually in- 
structed that no person was to be allowed to vote who 
did not pledge himself to vote in a particular way. 

In view of the predominance of Union men in the 
State, this course was unnecessary. Indeed, the provi- 
sional authorities themselves soon saw it, and at the 
next election — the one held in November, 1863 — they 
so far rectified the mistake as to require the soldiers to 
vote in their camps. This was a step in the right direc- 
tion, but it did not go far enough. The test oath for 
voters and candidates, which had been adopted as a safe- 
guard against the possibility of having a disloyal govern- 
ment, was retained ; and although there was never any 
occasion for testing its utility from this point of view, 
yet in theory at least it was assumed to have effected 
the purpose for which it was designed. In practice 
it did much more, for it led to results that were not 
generally contemplated. By disfranchising those who, 
whilst not being secessionists, would not pledge them- 



356 Missouri. 

selves not to aid those of their friends and relatives who 
were, it virtually handed the State over to the radical 
Eepublicans ; and what was far worse, it furnished them 
with a precedent for the long list of outrages which for 
some years made an election in Missouri such a sorrow- 
ful travesty. From 1862 to 1872 there was not an 
election held in the State that could be called either full, 
fair, or free ; and this result, so foreign to the spirit of 
our institutions, would hardly have been possible but for 
the precedent furnished by the adoption of this ordi- 
nance and the methods taken to enforce it. 

These were a few of the ills which grew out of this 
interference of the military with the civil authority, and 
to which the j>eople of Missouri were subjected. In the 
North, where there was, substantially, no difference of 
opinion, the evil was but little felt ; but in the border 
States, where every shade of sentiment existed, it was 
very real, and there can be no question as to the influ- 
ence it exerted. Grievous as it was, and numerous as 
were the individual cases of oppression to which it gave 
rise, it did not affect the action of the Union men of the 
State upon the one great issue of the war. Upon this 
point their conduct was uniformly consistent, and what- 
ever may have been their differences of opinion as to 
the means employed to restore the Union, they never 
wavered in their fidelity to it. In fact, so determined 
were their efforts in this direction that they not only 
succeeded in establishing order over the greater part of 
the State, especially in those regions in which they were 
not hampered by Federal interference, but they an- 
swered every demand made upon them by the national 
authorities for men, without a draft, and with but a rel- 
atively small expenditure for bounties. 



THE END OF THE WAR. 357 

Notwithstanding the heavy contingent which the State 
sent into the Confederate service, she furnished to the 
Union army 109,000 men, over nine per cent, of her 
entire population, or forty-seven per cent, of the num- 
ber available for military purposes. The extent of this 
drain will be better understood if we compare it with the 
number of men furnished by the other States. Accord- 
ing to the official reports, the percentage of troops to 
population in the Western States and Territories was 
13.6 per cent., and in the New England States twelve 
per cent. ; whilst in Missouri, if we add to her quota the 
30,000 men who went into the Southern army, it was 
fourteen per cent., or sixty per cent, of those who were 
subject to military duty. These are instructive figures, 
and they become more so when taken in connection with 
the fact that at the presidential election of 1860, Lin- 
coln had but a tenth of the vote cast in the State. 

Of the loss of life among the Missouri troops, Confed- 
erate as well as Federal, it is impossible to speak with 
accuracy, as there is no record of the mortality of those 
who went South. In the Union army, the deaths are put 
down at 13,885 — a fraction over twelve per cent, of all 
the men furnished by the State, — of which number 
3,317 were either killed, or died of wounds received in 
battle. These are the official figures, and they are no 
doubt correct as far as they go, though it is doubtful 
whether they include the number of deaths among the 
state troops, who were never in the service of the United 
States. Of the mortality among the Confederates we 
are, as has been said, without any official record ; and 
the facts upon which we have to depend are of such a 
character that any attempt to fix the number of deaths 
among them must be but the merest guess-work. It is 



358 Missouri. 

probable, however, that the ratio among them, especially 
in the cases of deaths from disease, was much greater 
than among the Union troops, owing to the unwonted 
hardships they were called upon to endure, and the want 
of medicines and suitable hospital accommodations for 
the sick and wounded. Taking these facts into consider- 
ation, and bearing in mind the privations to which they 
were unavoidably subjected in the way of an insufficiency 
of food and clothing, it is believed that an estimate, 
placing the total number of their deaths at forty per 
cent., would be within the bounds of reason. This would 
carry their loss up to 12,000 men, and adding this number 
to the deaths that occurred in the Federal service, it 
will swell the aggregate mortality in the two armies to 
25,885. This estimate does not cover those who were 
killed in the skirmishes that took place between the 
home guards and the guerrillas ; nor does it include 
those who were not in either army, but who were shot 
down by " bushwhackers " and " bushwhacking " Federal 
soldiers. Of these latter there is no record, though 
there were but few sections of the State in which such 
scenes were not more or less frequent. Assuming the 
deaths from these two sources to have been 1,200, and 
summing up the results, it will be found that the num- 
ber of Missourians who were killed in the war and died 
from disease during their term of service amounted to 
not less than 27,000 men. 

Heavy as was this loss of life, that of property was 
relatively quite as great. Leaving out of consideration 
the value of the slaves, which may be roughly estimated 
at $40,000,000, the other elements of wealth exhibit a 
marked decrease during the war and after. As late as 
1868, after two years of prosperity, the taxable wealth of 



THE END OF THE WAR. 359 

the State was rated at only $454,000,000, or $46,000,000 
less than the amount returned in 1860. In many por- 
tions of the State, especially in the southern and west- 
ern borders, whole counties had been devastated. The 
houses were burned, the fences destroyed, and the farms 
laid waste. Much of the livestock of the State had dis- 
appeared ; and everywhere, even in those sections that 
were comparatively quiet and peaceful, the quantity of 
land in cultivation was much less than it had been at the 
outbreak of the war. Added to these sources of decline, 
and in some measure a cause of them, was the consider- 
able emigration from the State which now took place, 
and particularly from those regions that lay in the path- 
way of the armies, or from those neighborhoods that 
were given over to the " bushwhackers." The amount of 
loss from these different sources cannot be accurately 
gauged, but some idea may be formed of it, and of the 
unsettled condition of affairs, from the fact that only 41 
out of the 113 counties in the State receipted for the tax 
books for 1861 ; and in these counties, only $250,000 
out of the $600,000 charged against them were collected. 
In the last two years of the war, the collections in por- 
tions of the State are said to have been better, though 
they were still far from satisfactory ; and yet, notwith- 
standing these unfavorable conditions, the State expended 
over $7,000,000 in fitting out and maintaining her troops. 
The bulk of this sum was afterwards returned to her 
by the general government, and as it was used in paying 
the indebtedness which she had failed to meet during 
the war, it enabled her to reestablish her credit upon 
the favorable basis upon which it now rests. 

Of the numerous and daring raids that were made 
into the State we have not thought it necessary to speak, 



360 MISSOURI. 

as they had no appreciable influence upon the result, 
either in Missouri or upon the country at large. Even 
when intended to mask some important movement, or to 
prevent reinforcements from being sent to a threatened 
point, they can hardly be considered as successful, since, 
as a rule, after the spring of 1862, the state troops and 
the enrolled militia could be depended upon to give a 
satisfactory account of these most unwelcome visitors. 
Such, though, was not always the case, and notably so 
in the raid led by Price in September, 1864. Entering 
the southeastern portion of the State at the head of 
12,000 men, this gallant officer came within forty miles 
of St. Louis, passed in sight of Jefferson City, and mov- 
ing up the Missouri, captured Lexington and Indepen- 
dence. Here he was confronted by troops from Kansas, 
and being closely followed by General Pleasonton with 
a large force of cavalry, he turned southward and made 
his escape into Arkansas, but not without heavy loss in 
men and material. In the course of the raid he marched 
1,434 miles, fought forty-three battles and skirmishes, and 
according to his own calculation destroyed upwards of 
" ten million dollars worth of property," a fair share of 
which belonged to his own friends. 

Considered with reference to the number of men, the 
distance marched, the battles fought, and the amount of 
property destroyed, this was one of the most memorable 
raids of the war ; and yet it is difficult to see what the 
Confederate authorities expected to gain by the move- 
ment. Price was not strong enough to maintain him- 
self in the State against the overwhelming odds that 
could be concentrated against him, and without some 
such prospect his expedition was a predestined failure. 
As matters turned out, it did not prevent reinforcements 



THE END OF THE WAR. 361 

from being sent to Thomas at Nashville, nor did it exert 
any perceptible influence upon the presidential election of 
that year. The property destroyed, at least that part of 
it which belonged to the federal government, was never 
missed ; and it is probable that, after making due allow- 
ance for the exaggerations on both sides, Price lost, in 
men and material, quite as much as he gained. 

This was the last effort made to carry the war into 
Missouri. In the following spring Grant and Lee closed 
in the death struggle around Richmond, and in the pres- 
ence of this battle of giants all minor combats were 
dwarfed. When at last, on the 9th of April, it was 
known that the Confederate army, reduced to a mere 
handful but still ready for duty, had surrendered, the 
news brought a universal feeling of relief. By a proc- 
lamation of Governor Fletcher the 15th was set apart 
as a day of thanksgiving for " this hope of peace," and 
there were but few Missourians, Union men or secession- 
ists, who did not join in the glad acclaim. 

In due time the Confederate forces on the west side of 
the Mississippi laid down their arms, and in June some 
eight thousand of them arrived in St. Louis. Speaking 
of this event, the " Republican " of that city held the fol- 
lowing language, which, mutatis mutandis, may with 
equal justice be applied to the gallant men who followed 
the flag of the Union. "In a few days all that por- 
tion of the rebel army which was recruited in Missouri, 
with the exception of a few who prefer to remain in 
the South, . . . will have returned to their farms, or 
their former places of labor or business throughout the 
State, and their character, habits and feeling as sol- 
diers will disappear as they resume their old habits as 
citizens." 



362 Missouri. 

These pleasing anticipations were soon realized, though 
in certain portions of the State, especially along the 
southern and western borders, the guerrillas and ma- 
rauders of all kinds showed an unwillingness to give up 
their freebooting habits and return to an orderly mode 
of life. The state authorities, however, proved equal to 
the occasion. Governor Fletcher ordered a large force 
into the disturbed districts, and this, taken in connection 
with the summary action of the people in certain counties, 
soon stamped out the evil. The turbulent spirits bred 
by the war, federal as well as rebel, were soon made to 
understand that the civil authority was again supreme, 
and that crime, no matter of what character or by whom 
committed, could no longer be cloaked under the guise 
of military necessity. In these disturbances the old 
soldiers, the men who had faced each other in the battle- 
field, were not arrayed on opposite sides, but they stood 
together for the maintenance of law and order. In the 
hard school of the war they had learned to respect each 
other, and as they had put away all feelings of hatred 
and uncharitableness when they laid aside their muskets, 
they found no difficulty in working together for the sup- 
pression of crime, the restoration of order, and the good 
of the State. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

ABOLITION OF SLAVERY. THE CONVENTION OF 1865 
AND TEST OATHS. 

Turning now to the political history of these years 
we find that although the Emancipation Proclamation 
of President Lincoln did not apply to Missouri, yet the 
question of the abolition of slavery in the State entered 
largely into the local politics of the day. At the elec- 
tion held in November, 1862, for members of the Gen- 
eral Assembly, a majority of emancipationists were re- 
turned, though they were unable to take any definite 
action in the matter, owing to the exhausted condition 
of the state treasury, and to the constitutional provision, 
which forbade the emancipation of slaves without the 
consent of the owners, or the payment of a full equiva- 
lent for the slaves so freed. Satisfied that the people 
of the State were in favor of doing away with slavery, 
the legislature indicated it so plainly that Governor 
Gamble summoned the convention to meet on the 15th 
of June, 1863, for the purpose of acting upon the ques- 
tion. After a prolonged debate, an ordinance was 
adopted which provided for gradual emancipation, and 
the convention then adjourned sine die. 

The plan as adopted was as just and fair as any meas- 
ure of confiscation can be said to be, but it did not sat- 
isfy the radical Republicans of the State. They wanted 
to have the slaves made free at once, and to effect this, 



364 Missouri. 

they sent a committee to Washington for the purpose of 
inducing President Lincoln to extend the area within 
which his proclamation was operative, so as to include 
Missouri. Failing in the object of their visit, they re- 
turned home, and at once began their preparations for 
the election of November, 1864. Upon the^ direct issue 
of immediate and unconditional emancipation they 
carried the State by a majority of 30,000, though the 
total vote was but little more than half what it had been 
four years before. It was the first election for state 
officers that had been held since the beginning of the 
war, Provisional Governor Gamble having been ap- 
pointed by the convention, as was Lieutenant Governor 
W. P. Hall, who became governor upon the death of 
Gamble in January, 1864. 

The proposition to hold another convention having 
been carried, the delegates chosen to that body met at 
St. Louis on the 6th of January, 1865. Divided accord- 
ing to their nativities, it will be seen that thirty-five 
of them were born in the slave States, twenty-one in the 
free States, nine in Europe, and one is not given. Politi- 
cally speaking, they were, as a rule, new men. But few 
of them were known outside of their immediate neighbor- 
hood, and it is but fair to add, in view of the specimen 
of political handiwork which they turned out, that still 
fewer of them were ever heard of again. The constitu- 
tion which they framed, despite certain good provisions, 
evinced such a spirit of political intolerance, showed so 
clearly that its authors were unfit for statesmanlike work, 
that they were speedily relegated to the obscurity from 
which they should never have been taken. Unquestion- 
ably much of the bitter feeling displayed in this instru- 
ment can be ascribed to the excitement of the hour, and 



ABOLITION OF SLAVERY. 365 

it would no doubt be pleasant if it could all be assigned 
to this cause. Unfortunately for this theory, the course 
of the radicals in carrying out these invidious restric- 
tions, after the necessity for them had passed away, af- 
fords ground for the belief that their object in adopting 
them was not so much to punish the rebels, as it was to 
give the control of the State to the wing of the Repub- 
lican party to which they belonged. 

The first measure upon which, under the terms of the 
call, the convention was expected to act, was the one for 
the abolition of slavery. This was soon settled. On the 
11th of January George P. Strong, of St. Louis, reported 
" An Ordinance abolishing Slavery in Missouri," 
and recommended its passage. Various attempts were 
made to amend it, but they were voted down, and the 
ordinance, as reported, was passed by a practically 
unanimous vote, there being sixty for it, to four against 
it, whilst two were absent. A copy of the Ordinance, 
duly signed and attested, was forwarded by special mes- 
senger to Governor Fletcher, and in accordance with the 
request of the convention he issued a proclamation, de- 
claring " that henceforth and forever, no person within 
the jurisdiction of the State shall be subject to any 
abridgment of liberty, except such as the law shall pre- 
scribe for the common good, or know any master but 
God." 

At this time there were probably a hundred and 
fourteen thousand negroes in the State, worth for pur- 
poses of taxation forty millions of dollars. Ostensibly 
they were slaves, but practically they were not, for it 
was clearly understood, even by the slaveholders, that 
the institution in Missouri was dead, and that all that 
remained to be done was to see that it was decently 



366 Missouri. 

and legally buried. The opportunity to do this was 
afforded by the convention ; and in promptly availing 
themselves of it, the people of Missouri may justly 
claim for her the credit of being the only one of the 
slave States which voluntarily and of its own accord 
abolished slavery. As we have repeatedly had occasion 
to declare, the people of the State had never been enam- 
ored of the institution, had in fact tolerated it from 
an unwillingness to interfere with vested rights ; and 
in striking it down they not only gave abundant proof 
of this fact, and at a cost, to the State, of a portion of 
the revenue of which she was sorely in need, but they 
again served notice upon the Confederate authorities 
that Missouri was in the Union and proposed to stay 
there. 

Having disposed of this question in a satisfactory 
manner, the convention might well have adjourned, as 
the disfranchisement of the rebels, the one other matter 
upon which it was expected that action would be taken, 
had been accomplished by the convention which met in 
June, 1862, so far as it was possible to effect that pur- 
pose by a constitutional enactment. This action was by 
no means satisfactory to the members of the present 
convention. From the first they had fallen under the 
control of a few extremists, who were determined to be 
satisfied with nothing less than a thorough remodeling 
of the constitution ; and under their lead it was com- 
placently resolved that the people " intended and ex- 
pected " not only that slavery should be abolished and 
disloyalists disfranchised, but that the constitution should 
be so amended as to bring it into harmony with the 
change that had taken place in the industrial and po- 
litical condition of the State. Doubtful as this measure 



ABOLITION OF SLAVERY. 367 

was from a legal point of view, the members of the 
convention thought proper to regard it as tantamount to 
a removal of the restrictions imposed upon them by the 
call under which they met ; and they proceeded to frame 
an entirely new constitution. This was submitted to 
the people, for ratification, in June, 1865, and was ac- 
cepted by a majority of eighteen hundred in a total 
vote of eighty-five thousand. 

In some of its articles, notably in those that related 
to education and to banks and corporations, the new 
constitution was a decided improvement upon the one 
adopted in 1820, and still in force; but in the article 
on the right of suffrage, especially in the clause which 
established a test oath for voters, there were features 
that were so outrageous as to outweigh the good that 
might have come from those provisions that were clearly 
of a beneficent character. Without stopping to enu- 
merate the objections that might be urged against this 
particular clause, it will be sufficient to say that the 
oath as established was so comprehensive in its scope, 
and covered such a wide field of conduct past and future, 
that it is doubtful whether there was a prominent man 
in the State who could truthfully have taken it. Includ- 
ing subdivisions, there were over forty -five different 
offenses which the applicant for registration must swear 
he had never committed ; and unless he could do so, he 
was not to be allowed to vote, or hold any state, county, 
or municipal office, or act as a teacher in any school, or 
preach, or solemnize marriage, or practice law, or serve 
as juror. He could not even hold any real estate, or 
other property, in trust for the use of any church, re- 
ligious society, or congregation. 

In the attempt to enforce this iniquitous ordinance, 



368 Missouri. 

much trouble occurred. The judges of the supreme 
court, satisfied that it was null and void, refused, to va- 
cate their offices, and were forcibly ousted. Ministers 
of the gospel, Catholic priests, and sisters of charity en- 
gaged in teaching were arrested, and in some cases fined 
and imprisoned. Prominent lawyers like Samuel T. 
Glover, a member of the Union safety committee in 
1861, refused to abide by the law and challenged indict- 
ment ; and when in November, 1865, that gallant sol- 
dier General Frank Blair refused to take the oath and 
brought suit against the judges of the election for de- 
clining to receive his vote, it was felt, even by those 
who had approved the ordinance, that the time had come 
when its enforcement was no longer possible. At the 
meeting of the legislature, in January, 1867, Governor 
Fletcher, who had opposed the adoption of the con- 
stitution, recommended that the 9th section of the 2d 
article should be stricken out for the reason that it had 
not prevented disloyal persons from being lawyers and 
school-teachers, and because " bishops, priests, and min- 
isters teach and pray without taking the prescribed 
oath," thereby setting an example of disobedience to 
law, which may ultimately lead to anarchy. Before the 
legislature could act upon his recommendation, the su- 
preme court of the United States, in January, 1867, 
decided that the test oath was unconstitutional. 

The announcement of this decision gave a measure 
of relief to the people of the State, though the reign of 
intolerance was not yet over. The test oath and the 
methods taken to enforce it had brought a number of 
exceedingly small men to the front ; and as they were 
naturally desirous of prolonging their lease of power, 
they adopted, in January, 1868, another registry law 



ABOLITION OF SLAVERY. 369 

which was even more stringent than the one it super- 
seded. Under it, the governor, by and with the advice 
and consent of the Senate, was authorized, at every 
general election, to appoint a superintendent of registra- 
tion in each senatorial district. These superintendents 
appointed a board of registration for each county, to 
whom was committed the whole electoral machinery of 
the State, with power to purge the voting lists at their 
own sweet will. In the hands of facile officials it was 
easy, under this law, to produce any given result, and 
there can be no doubt as to the unflinching manner in 
which this privilege of purgation was exercised in some 
portions of the State. At the election in November, 
1868, the radicals were successful, J. W. McClurg their 
candidate being chosen governor by a majority of over 
19,000, though the aggregate vote was only 145,000, 
20,000 less than it had been in 1860. 

Efficacious as this law had proved to be when judged 
from a party point of view, it did not enable the radi- 
cals to retain control of the State. The liberal Republi- 
cans as they were called, under the lead of B. Gratz 
Brown and Carl Schurz, had long been restive under 
this harsh legislation, and they now took issue with the 
radical wing of their party upon the question of uni- 
versal amnesty and universal enfranchisement. With 
the aid of such Democrats as were allowed to vote, they 
swept the State at the election held in the autumn of 
1870. In justice, however, to Governor McClurg and 
the General Assembly it must be said that, in point of 
liberality, they showed themselves to be in advance of 
their party. In his inaugural message the governor 
had called attention to the policy of removing the dis- 
abilities that had been imposed upon those who were 



3T0 MISSOURI. 

upon the side of the South during the war ; and at a 
special meeting of the legislature in January, 1870, it 
was resolved to submit to the people, for ratification, 
certain proposed amendments to the constitution of the 
State, which virtually covered this ground. By one of 
these amendments the test oath for voters was abolished ; 
another removed the disqualifications that had been im- 
posed on account of former acts of disloyalty, and also 
those that were due to race, color, or previous condition 
of servitude ; a third related to education ; and there 
were still others that referred to the courts and to banks 
and corporations. All of these amendments were adopted, 
and at the same election B. Gratz Brown, the liberal 
candidate, was chosen governor by a majority of 41,000 
in a total vote of 166,000. This, it will be observed, 
is only one thousand more than were cast ten years 
before, at the election of 1860, though the population 
of the State was now 1,728,000, or 540,000 greater than 
it then was. 

The repeal of these disfranchising and disqualifying 
laws swept away the last vestige of the intolerant legis- 
lation that grew out of the war ; and at the election 
of November, 1872, the Democratic party, composed 
largely of conservative Union men like Blair, Broad- 
head, Phelps, and others, carried the State by a majority 
of 35,000 in a total poll of 278,000. Compared with 
the vote of 1870, it will be observed that the increase in 
two years amounted to 112,000. This is too large to 
be attributed to natural causes ; and whilst it would be 
manifestly unjust to assert that it represents the number 
of persons who were disfranchised, yet it gives good 
ground for the conclusion that the number of those who 
were affected by this measure was much larger than is 
usually supposed. 



ABOLITION OF SLAVERY. 371 

With the success of the Democrats at this election, 
the control of the State passed into the hands of those 
who were entitled to it by virtue of their numbers ; and 
they still retain it. Of their management of affairs it 
is not my purpose to speak. Neither does it come within 
the limits of this work to treat of the rapid recovery of 
the State from the wounds of the civil war ; of her phe- 
nomenal increase in wealth and population during the 
five years immediately succeeding the return of peace, 
or of the liberality which she has displayed in advanc- 
ing the negro to all the privileges of citizenship. Facts 
upon these points are accessible to all, and as they con- 
tain within themselves the germs of actions whose re- 
sults have yet to be worked out, their discussion belongs 
to the political economist, and would be out of place at 
this time and in this connection. The career of Missouri, 
or rather that portion of it which belongs to the domain 
of history, may be said to have been ended with the 
abolition of slavery. For fifty years and more this had 
been the issue upon which parties, in their struggle for 
power, had been aligned ; and during all this period, 
through no desire of their own, but in opposition to their 
wishes as it was to their interests, it had furnished the 
people of the State with the motive for much of their 
political action. With its removal from the field of 
contention, the motive also disappeared ; but in its place 
we have new interests, and these will give rise to new 
issues, around which parties will form. This will again 
bring on the struggle for power which in some shape 
has been going on since the formation of society, and 
will continue as long as human nature remains un- 
changed. 



INDEX. 



Adams, John Quincy, 79, 80, 144, 161, 

189, 193. 
Agriculture, 24, 26. 
Alabama, admitted, 141. 
Allouez, Father, 6. 
Almonaster, Don Andres, 47. 
Almonte, General, 191, 198. 
Amusements, 48. 

Arabe, Jose Ignacio, letter of, 210. 
Archuleta, Don Diego, 201, 212, 217. 
Arista, General, 199. 
Arkansas, admission of, 144. 
Armijo, Governor, 201, 212. 
Arsenal, St. Louis, importance of, 

291, 294, 299 ; garrisoned, 297. 
Assessments, 352. 
Atchison, D. R., 244, 246. 
Atlantic coast, colonized, 3. 
Augney, Captain, 215, 216. 

Backwoodsman, the, 96. 

Balance of power, 140-246. 

Banks, chartered, 133, 165, 168 ; sus- 
pension of, 164-166. 

Barbe-Marbois, 77. 

Barter, 45. 

Barton, David, 174. 

Bates, Edward, 296. 

Bates, Frederick, 123. 

Bell, Major W. H., 292, 294. 

Bent, Governor Charles, 204, 212, 214, 
217. 

Benton, Thomas H., 174, 186, 212, 227, 
228, 229-233 ; his appeal to the peo- 
ple, 222, 225 ; elected to Congress, 
231. 

Biddle, Major, report on fur trade, 129. 

Bienviile, 20, 24, 26. 

Blair, F. P., Jr., 178, 204, 274, 277, 291, 
293, 296, 305, 351. 

Blandowski, Captain, killed, 306. 

Bledsoe, Captain H., 315. 

Blue lodges, 243. 

Boone, Daniel, 58. 

Boonville, skirmish at, 313. 

Border troubles, 347. 

Bowen, General John S., 258. 



Bracito, skirmish at, 207. 
Broadhead, James O., 290, 370. 
Browne, Joseph, 87. 
Brown, B. Gratz, 178, 369, 370. 
Brown, John, 251, 252, 255. 
Bruff, Major, 88, 90, 93. 
Buchanan, James, 250, 296. 
Burgwin, Captain, 215, 217. 
Burr, Aaron, 91. 

Cahokia, taken by Clark, 50. 

Calhoun, John C, 222, 228. 

Calv<§, 52. 

Camp Jackson, 301 ; taken, 305 ; ef- 
fect of capture of, 306, 307. 

Carthage, skirmish at, 315. 

Cathedral, built, 124. 

Cavelier, 17, 18. 

Charless, Joseph, 151. 

Chartres, Fort, 32, 56. 

Chihuahua, occupied, 209. 

Chouteau, Auguste, 33, 122, 123. 

Chouteau, Pierre, 99. 

Citizens, interference with, 346. 

Clark, Major M. L., 208. 

Clark, General George R., 50, 51, 52. 

Clark, Governor William, 92, 105, 116, 
117, 124. 

Clay, Henry, 149, 155, 175, 192, 198. 

Clay's compromise, 149, 155, 159. 

Commerce, 44. 

Conant, Major, 312. 

Confederates, hesitation of, 318 ; ad- 
vance of, 325, 326 ; disagreements 
among, 327 ; return of, 361 ; retreat 
of, 335 ; surrender of, 3G1. 

Constitution of 1820, 163 ; amended, 
165. 

Convention of 1820, 150, 151. 

Convention of 1861, called, 278 ; effect 
of, 278 ; canvass for delegates to, 
281 ; election of members to, 284, 
298 ; second session, 320 ; adjourn- 
ment of, 290-363. 

Convention of 1865, 364. 

Copper, search for, 22, 24. 

Cruzat, Lieutenant-Governor, 50, 55. 



374 



INDEX. 



Currency, 164, 165. 
Curtis, General, 337. 

Davis, Jefferson, 108. 

Delassus, Lieutenant-Governor, 44, 

56, 81, 134. 
De Leyba, Lieutenant-Governor, 50. 
Democrats successful in election, 371. 
Deruisseau, 27. 
Desmoines, the, explored, 24. 
De Soto, 1, 2. 

Disabilities, political, removed, 369. 
Discontent with Federal rule, 343. 
Disfranchisement of rebels, 355. 
Doniphan, Colonel A. W., 183, 184, 

204, 205, 207, 212. 
Douay, Father, 17, 18. 
Dubourg, Bishop, 123, 125. 
Ducharme, 51. 
Dutigne, 24. 
Duke, Basil W., 298. 
Du Lhut, 14. 
Dyer, Lieutenant, 216. 

Earthquake, the New Madrid, 108. 
Easton, Rufus, 88. 
Edmonson, Major, 215. 
Education, 236. 
Edwards, Governor, 105. 
Elections, interference with, 354. 
Election of 1860 for President, 264. 
Election of 1844, 192. 
Election of 1840, 167. 
Eliot, Rev. William G., 353. 
Emancipation, 173, 175-363. 
Emancipation proclamation, 344. 
Emigrant Aid companies, 242. 
Ewing, General Thomas, 350. 
Exchange Bank, 166. 
Exports, 127. 

Federal advance, 337. 
Filley, Oliver D., 310. 
Fletcher, Governor Thomas C, 361, 

362, 365, 368. 
Flint, Timothy, 95, 96. 
Florida, divided, 69. 
Fort Crevecceur, 13, 14. 
Fort Orleans, 25. 
Fort St. Louis of the Illinois, 15. 
Frdmont, General John C, 325, 336. 
French wars, 3. 
Frontenac, 7, 16. 
Frost, General D. M., 258, 292, 299, 

301, 304, 306. 
Fur-trade, 4, 13, 24, 26, 32, 128. 

Gaines, General E. P., 199, 200. 
Galvez, Governor, 51, 52, 71. 
Gamble, Governor H. R., 176, 296, 320, 

343, 363, 364. 
Gantt, Thomas T.,312. 



Gardoqui, 59. 

Gayoso, 58. 

Geyer, Henry S., the "Whig candidate, 

elected Senator, 231. 
Gilpin, Major William, 205, 207. 
Glenn, Luther J. , 286. 
Glover, Samuel T., 303, 368. 
Granby Mines, 316. 
Granger, Postmaster-General, 87. 
Greene, Colton, 298. 
Groseilliers, 6. 
Guadalupe Hidalgo, treaty of, 212, 

217. 
Guibor, Captain, 315, 317. 

Hall, W. A., 290, 312. 

Hall, W. P., 204, 364. 

Halleck, General H. W., 348. 

Hammond, Colonel, 88. 

Hard money, 164. 

Hard times, 136, 167, 170. 

Harding, General James, 316, 318, 
340. 

Harding, Colonel Chester, Jr. , 325. 

Harney, General W. S., 258, 298, 304, 
309 311. 

Harrison, William H., 54, 88, 171. 

Haughn's Mills, massacre at, 183. 

Hempstead, Ed., 115. 

Hennepin, Father, 14. 

Hindes, Russell, 257, 258. 

Home guards, organized, 277 ; mus- 
tered into service, 297. 

Howard, Governor, 102, 105, 108, 116. 

Iberville, 19, 20. 

Illinois, the district of, 39. 

Immigrants, character of, 98 ; num- 
ber of, 117 ; life of, 118. 

Indians, war with, 25-105 ; exemption 
from attacks of, 53 ; removal of, 
55 ; specimens of eloquence, 54, 
102, 204; treaties with, 84, 99, 103, 
107, 205 ; treatment of, 53, 54, 100. 

Insurrection, New Mexican, 212. 

Internal improvements, 233. 

Interview between Jackson and Lyon, 
312. 

Iroquois war, 5. 

Jackson, Andrew, 190. 

Jackson, Colonel Congreve, 207. 

Jackson, Governor C. F., 221, 267, 
270, 292, 298, 314, 318; refuses 
troops to federal government, 299 ; 
proclamation of, 313. 

Jackson resolutions, 221, 223 ; mean- 
ing of, 226. 

Jamestown, settled, 3. 

Jefferson, Thomas, 77, 82, 84, 87, 93. 

Joliet, 4, 7, 12 ; descends the Missis- 
sippi, 9. 



INDEX. 



375 



Joutel, 17, 18. 
Jurisprudence, system of, 40. 

Kansas, visited, 24 ; character of im- 
migrants to, 243, 245, 247, 24S ; 
jayhawkers, 251 ; first electiou in, 
249, 250 ; report on troubles in, 253, 

Kaskaskia, 21, 56 ; founded, 22 ; taken 
by Clark, 50. 

Kearney, General S. W., 200, 202, 
205, 212. 

Kennett, Luther M., elected to Con- 
gress, 231. 

King, Rufus, 68, 138. 

La Barre, Governor, 16. 

Laclede, 33. 

Lake Superior, 4. 

Land grants, 24 ; amount of, 60 ; con- 
firmed, 61, 84, 112 ; liberality of, 
58, 59 ; in New Madrid, 111 ; school 
purposes, 112; made to settlers, 
46. 

Land, increase in value of, 59, 94, 123. 

Lane, James H., 334, 347, 348, 349. 

UAnnke du coup, 50. 

UAnnee des diz batteaux, 55. 

IS Annie des grands eaux, 55. 

La Salle, 6, 13, 14, 15, 16, 18, 19. 

Laussat, 80. 

Lawrence, massacre of, 350. 

Lead, amount mined, 127. 

Lead mines, 23, 24-26. 

LeClerc, Father, 17. 

Legislature, organized, 267, 280 ; ad- 
journment of, 290 ; summoned to 
meet, 300 ; resolves to secede, 336. 

Le Sonneur, speech of, 102. 

Lewis and Clark, expedition of, 92. 

Lewis, Governor Merriwether, 92, 93, 
99, 102. 

Lexington, campaign of, 334. 

Libraries, 123. 

Lincoln, Abraham, 108, 266, 311, 345, 
348, 351, 364. 

Linn, Lewis F., 186. 

Lisa, Manuel, 128. 

Livingston, R. R-, 68, 76, 77. 

Loan certificates, 136. 

Louisiana, colony of, a failure, 28 ; 
population of, 29 ; cost of colony of, 
29, 30, 41 ; given to Spain, 31 ; taxes 
in, 41 ; divided, 32 ; purchased, 77, 
80. 

Louisiana territory, 87, 115. 

Louisiana, district of, 82. 

Lovejoy, Rev. E. P., 176, 177, 178. 

Lucas, J. B. C, 87, 887 

Lyon, General Nathaniel, 294, 297, 298, 
302, 305, 312, 314, 325, 329, 330,332. 

Madison, James, 68, 75, 78. 



Maklot, J., 128. 

Manners and customs, 42. 

Manufactures, 44. 

Marmaduke, Governor John S., 309, 

314, 340. 

Marquette, Father, 4, 6, 8, 9, 10, 12. 

Mernbre\ Father, 14, 15, 17. 

Message, Governor Stewart's, 268. 

Message, Governor Jackson's, 272. 

Mexico, French expedition to, 22 ; re- 
volt from Spain, 190. 

Military law, the, 300. 

Miro, Governor, 49, 59. 

Missionaries, zeal of, 4. 

Mississippi, discovered and explored, 
1, 6, 8, 14, 15 ; a French river, 20 ; 
closed to the United States, 72 ; 
navigation of, 130. 

Missouri, applies for admission, 138 ; 
debate on admission, 142, 154 ; ad- 
mission of, objected to, 152; admitted 
into the Confederacy, 336 ; admitted 
into the Union, 158, 161 ; character 
of population of, 260 ; evacuated by 
Confederates, 341, 342, 357. 

Missouri Compromise, adopted, 146 ; 
Southern vote for, 147 ; its effect, 
149, 158 ; violated and repealed, 186, 
241 ; unconstitutional, 358. 

Missouri Confederates, 1st and 2d 
Brigades, 339 ; number of, 340 ; 
mortality among, 357. 

Missouri Federals, number of, 340, 
357 ; mortality among, 357. 

Missouri state guard, organization of, 
316 ; ordered to be raised, 319. 

Missourians not secessionists, 222, 229, 
230-264 ; nor slavery propagandists, 
226 230. 

Mitchell, Colonel D. D., 207. 

Montgomery, 257. 

Morales, 74, 75. 

Mormon war, 179. 

Mormons, driven from the State, 183 ; 
move to Illinois, 185 ; driven from 
Illinois, 185. 

Museum of Indian articles, 124. 

McCulloch, General Benjamin, 314, 

315, 319, 326, 328, 330, 333, 338. 
McClurg, Governor J. W. , 369. 
McDonald, Captain Emmett, released 

by the court, 306. 

Napton, W. B., 221. 

Nelson, Captain, ascends the Missouri, 
133. 

New Mexico, annexed, 202 ; end of in- 
surrection in, 217 ; insurrection in, 
212 ; purchase of, 219. 

Newspaper, first, published in Missou- 
ri, 123. 

Nicolet, on the Wisconsin, 4. 



376 



INDEX. 



Ohio River, discovered, 6. 
Ohio valley, population of, 75. 
Order restored in Missouri, 362. 
Order No. 11,350. 
Order of enrollment, 343. 
Ordinance of 1787, 57. 
O'Reilly, 37, 53. 
Osage River, explored, 24. 
Owens, Samuel C, killed, 209. 

Pea Ridge, battle of, 338. 

Pearce, General, 326. 

Penicaut, 21. 

Perez, Lieutenant-Governor, 55. 

Phelps, JohnS., 370. 

Piasa Bluffs, 9. 

Piernas, Lieutenant-Governor, 50. 

Pierre, Don Eugenio, 70. 

Pinckney, Charles, 154. 

Pittman, Captain, 27. 

Platte purchase, the, 185 ; a violation 
of the Missouri Compromise, 186. 

Pleasanton, General, 360. 

Plummer, Captain, 330, 331. 

Politics, 47. 

Political power, 162, 371. 

Political parties, 294. 

Polk, James K., 193, 198, 204, 218. 

Post-offices established, 123. 

Prairie du Chien, attack on, 105. 

Price, General Sterling, 306, 309, 310, 
313, 316, 326, 328-330, 333, 335; 
farewell to state guard, 338 ; in 
New Mexico, 213, 215, 217, 219; 
elected president of the convention, 
286 ; raids into Missouri, 360. 

Price, Major Thomas H., 317. 

Price-Harvey agreement, the, 309. 

Quebec settled, 3. 

Radisson, 6. 

Raids, 359, 360. 

Railroads, aided, 235. 

Randolph, John, 84, 90. 

Read, Jacob, 132. 

Rebels, disfranchised, 355, 367. 

Re"collet mission, on Lake Huron, 5. 

Reeder, Governor A. H. , 249. 

Reid, Captain John W., 205, 209; 
rescues Mexican captives, 210. 

Religion, 48. 

Remonstrance and petition, 83. 

Report of Committee on Federal Re- 
lations, 287. 

Retreat of state guard, 314. 

Riddick, Thomas F., 114. 

Robinson, Governor Charles, letter to 
Fremont, 348, 349. 

Rollins, James S., defends Mormons, 
184. 



Sacramento, battle of, 208. 

Safety committee, members of, 303; 
meeting of, 303 ; circular of, 310. 

Santa Fe, taken, 200 ; overland trade 
with, 201. 

Schewe, C. F., 125. 

Schofield, General J. M., 343, 344, 
351. 

Schools, 47, 124. 

School fund, amount of, 239. 

Schurz, Carl, 369. 

Shelby, General J. O., 340. 

Shot, manufactured, 128. 

Sigel, General F., 315, 329, 333. 

Silver, search for, 22. 

Slavery, introduced, 24 ; profitable, 
27, 46 ; position of South on ques- 
tion of, 148 ; sanctioned in Missouri, 
151 ; division of parties on, 162 ; 
decline of agitation, 172 ; agitation 
of, renewed, 220 ; abolished, 365. 

Slaves, number of, 244, 260. 

Slidell, John, 199. 

Smith, Hyrum, 185. 

Smith, Joseph, 179, 184, 185. 

Snead, Colonel Thomas L., 298, 312, 
316. 

Society, state of, 93. 

Solemn public act, the, 156. 

Spain, in Louisiana, 36 ; closes the 
Mississippi, 72 ; troubles with, 372. 

Speculation, mania for, 134, 167, 169. 

Springfield, occupied by Lyon, 324 ; 
battle of, 330. 

State Bank, chartered, 164. 

State convention of 1820, 150, 151. 

State debt, 235. 

State guard, 309 ; broken up, 338, 
339. 

State university established, 185. 

St. Ange de Bellerive, 35, 50, 56. 

St. Esprit, mission of, 4. 

Ste. Genevieve, founded, 21. 

St. Ignatius, mission of, 7. 

St. Ildefonso, treaty of, 63. 

St. Louis, attack on, 50 ; fortified, 55 ; 
progress of, 122 ; population of, 
126 ; trade of, 127. 

St. Vrain, 215. 

Steamboat, the first, on western rivers, 
131. 

Sterling, Captain, 33. 

Stewart, Governor R. M., 223, 231. 

Stoddard, Major Amos, 81, 82. 

Stringfellow, B. F., 231, 246. 

Strong, Geo. P., 365. 

Sturgis, Major S. D., 314, 332. 

Sweeny, General T. W., 298, 311. 

Tallmadge's amendment, 138, 141, 

142. 
Taos, capture of, 216. 



INDEX. 



377 



Tappan, Arthur, 174, 175. 

Taylor, General Zachary, 200, 211, 212. 

Tecumseh, 10G. 

Territory, population of, 86, 121. 

Texas, exchanged for Florida, 148, 
189 ; efforts to recover, 189 ; revolts 
from Mexico, 190 ; independence 
of, acknowledged, 190 ; annexation 
of, 189, 191, 198 ; a party question, 
192 ; admitted into the Union, 198. 

Thomas, Jesse B., author of the Mis- 
souri Compromise, 149. 

Thornton, Captain, attacked by Mex- 
icans, 199. 

Tippecanoe, battle of, 106. 

Toleration, religious, 58, 59. 

Tomas, 217. 

Tompkins, George, 125. 

Tonti, 14, 16, 18, 20. 

Totten, Captain, 330, 331, 332. 

Treaty of Madrid, 74 ; of Paris, 31, 
69 ; with England, 69. 

Trudeau, Lieutenant-Governor, 49, 
54 56. 

Tyler, John, 187, 190. 

Ulloa, 34, 37, 81. 
United States Bank, 164, 167. 
United States Constitution, violated 
by Northern States, 265. 



United States, protest of, against ces- 
sion of Louisiana to France, 68. 

United States take possession of 
Louisiana, 81. 

University, St. Louis, 125. 

Van Buren, M., 170, 190. 
Van Dorn, General Earl, 337. 
Vaudreuil, Governor, 24, 27. 
Vigil, Cornelio, 215. 
Village lots, 46-112. 

War with England, 105, 106; with 

Mexico, 199. 
Weightman, Captain Richard, 208, 

211. 
Wells, Carty, 221. 
Whigs, the, disappointed, 187. 
Wilkinson, General James, 80, 87, 89, 

90, 91, 92. 
Williams, Henry W., 111. 
Wilson, John, account by, of a secret 

meeting in favor of emancipation, 

174. 
Wilson, Lieutenant, 216. 
Wisconsin, the, discovered byNicolet, 

4, 6. 

Teatman, James E., 296. 



American Commontoealtijs, 

EDITED BY 

HOEACE E. SCUDDER. 



A series of volumes devoted to the history of such States 
of the Union as have exerted a positive influence in the shap- 
ing of the national government, or have a striking political, 
social, or economical history. 

VIRGINIA. A History of the People. By John Esten 
Cooke, author of " Life of Stonewall Jackson/' etc. 

OREGON. The Struggle for Possession. By William 
Barrows, D. D. 

MARYLAND. The History of a Palatinate. By Wil- 
liam Hand Browne, Associate of Johns Hopkins University. 

KENT TICK Y. A Pioneer Commonwealth. By Nathaniel 
S. Shaler, S. D., Professor of Palaeontology, Harvard University. 

MICHIGAN. A History of Governments. By Thomas 
McIntyre Cooley, LL. D., formerly Chief Justice of Michigan. 

KANSAS. The Prelude to the War for the Union. By 
Leverett W. Spring, formerly Professor in English Literature 
in the University of Kansas. 

CALIFORNIA. From the Conquest in 1846 to the Second 
Vigilance Committee in San Francisco. By Josiah Royce, for- 
merly Professor in the University of California. 

NEW YORK. The Planting and the Growth of the Em- 
pire State. By the Hon. Ellis H. Roberts, author of " Govern- 
ment Revenue." In two volumes. 

CONNECTIC TIT. By Professor Alexander Johnston, 
author of " American Politics." 

MISSOURI. By Lucien Carr, M. A., Assistant Cura- 
tor of the Peabody Museum of Archaeology. 

INDIANA. By J. P. Dunn, Jr., author of " Massacres 

of the Mountains." (Nearly Ready.) 
OHIO. By Hon. Rufus Kino. {Nearly Ready,) 

In Preparation. 

NEW JERSEY. By Austin Scott, Ph. D., Professor 

of History, etc., in Rutgers College. 
PENNSYLVANIA. By Hon. Wayne McVeagh, late 

Attorney- General of the United States. 

Other volumes to be announced hereafter. Each volume, 
with Map, 16mo, gilt top, $1.25. 



PRESS NOTICES. 



" VIRGINIA." 

Mr. Cooke has made a fascinating volume — one which it will be 
very difficult to surpass either in method or interest. If all the vol- 
umes of the series [" American Commonwealths "] come up to the 
level of this one — in interest, in broad tolerance of spirit, and in a 
thorough comprehension of what is best worth telling — a very great 
service will have been done to the reading public. True historic in- 
sight appears through all these pages, and an earnest desire to do all 
parties and religions perfect justice. The story of the settlement of 
Virginia is told in full. ... It is made as interesting as a romance. 
— The Critic (New York). 

It need not be said that it is written in a fascinating style, and ani- 
mated by a spirit of strong love for the author's native State, and 
pride in its history. It should be said further that it brings out many 
an obscure or forgotten bit of history, and makes real an epoch which 
is familiar to very few. — New York Evening Post. 

" OREGON." 

The long and interesting story of the struggle of five nations for 
the possession of Oregon is told in the graphic and reliable narrative 
of William Barrows. ... A more fascinating record has seldom been 
written. . . . Careful research and pictorial skill of narrative commend 
this book of antecedent history to all interested in the rapid march and 
wonderful development of our American civilization upon the Pacific 
coast. — Springfield Republican. 

There is so much that is new and informing embodied in this little 
volume that we commend it with enthusiasm. It is written with great 
ability. — Magazine of American History (New York). 

"MARYLAND." 

With great care and labor he has sought out and studied original 
documents. By the aid of these he is able to give his work a value 
and interest that would have been impossible had he followed slav- 
ishly the commonly accepted authorities on his subject. His investi- 
gation in regard to toleration in Maryland is particularly noticeable. 
— New York Evening Post. 

A substantial contribution to the history of America. — Magazine 
of American History. 



"KENTUCKY:' 

The author of it is admirably qualified to give us the history of the 
State of which he is a native, to the scientific examination of which 
he has given his eminent professional service, and of whose popula- 
tion he is proud because of the heroic and manly qualities it has mani- 
fested in many crises of its public affairs. — Christian Register (Bos- 
ton). 

Prof. Shaler sees how little the people he was born amongst know 
the rest of mankind, and how little they are in turn known ; and this 
book is chiefly an attempt to explain and defend the peculiar ideas of 
political and social life which characterize Kentuckians. This effort 
is successful and interesting. — Chicago Tribune. 

An excellent map of Kentucky is a welcome feature of this concise 
and well- writ ten volume. — Magazine of American History. 

"MICHIGAN:' 

An ably written and charmingly interesting volume. . . . For vari- 
ety of incident, for transitions in experience, for importance of events, 
and for brilliancy and ability in the service of the leading actors, the 
history of Michigan offers rare attractions ; and the writer of it has 
brought to his task the most excellent gifts and powers as a vigorous, 
impartial, and thoroughly accomplished historian. — Christian Register 
(Boston). 

Other States cover only special lines, as it were, of political history ; 
Michigan seems to have covered the whole, and hence furnishes an 
admirable field for a history of governments. More fortunate still, 
she has in Judge Cooley a man of great and acknowledged ability, 
learning, and authority upon all such themes. . . . From its distin- 
guished author, but even more from its profoundly valuable subject- 
matter, this is a work to repay abundantly the diligent study of all 
our citizens. — The Literary World. 

"KANSAS." 

Few, even of actual participants in the Kansas struggle, have so 
complete a knowledge of it that they cannot learn something from 
this narrative. Professor Spring has been diligent in research to a 
degree that merits special praise, and his diligence has been inspired 
and controlled by method, so that it has borne rich fruits. — The Ex- 
aminer (New York). 

In all respects one of the very best of the series. . . . His work ex- 
hibits diligent research, discrimination in the selection of the mate- 
rials, and skill in combining his chosen stuff into a narration that has 
unity, and order, and lucidity. — Hartford Courant. 



"CALIFORNIA." 

The formation of the modern commonwealth of California is a phe- 
nomenon which never has been matched, and probably never will be. 
. . . Mr. Royce has undertaken to study, in a philosophical spirit, the 
causes and circumstances of this social evolution. — New York Tribune. 

The study is one of sociological changes, never before known be- 
cause the sociological conditions have never before existed in history. 
The problem is new and most fascinating. Every facet of it has a 
distinct light. Professor Royce has turned it round and round, has 
received its various lights, and has cast upon it some of his own. 
. . . The style is as breezy as varied. — San Francisco Bulletin. 

"NEW YORK." 

The field occupied, embracing so much time and such variety of inci- 
dent, such extent of territory fought over and contended for by so 
many different races, so complete development of industrial and com- 
mercial interest, with all the institutions of social and civil life grow, 
ing up among a mixed and shifting population, requires that the 
historian have a full and firm grasp upon his subject, as a whole and 
in its details, that he may preserve harmony and proportion through- 
out. This requisite the author had, and his book is admirable in the 
just prominence given to the several topics according to their impor- 
tance to the story as a whole. — Boston Transcript. 

Mr. Roberts has executed his difficult task with signal ability. He 
has put into less than eight hundred pages all the truly significant 
events which have gone to the making up of New York history from 
1524 to the present day. — New York Journal of Commerce. 

" CONNECTICUT." 

The most interesting portions of Professor Johnston's valuable and 
spirited volume are those which demonstrate the precedence of Connec- 
ticut in the establishment of the democratic principle of government 
which now makes the essential feature of the American plan, and 
those which exhibit the influence of the Connecticut town-system in 
the development of our national theory of local self-rule combined 
with federal authority. In the prominence given to these important 
points the author shows an appreciation not only of the intrinsic 
character of his subject but of the best uses of the excellent and well 
edited series in which his book takes a high place. — New York Tribune. 

HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO., Boston. 



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